


Only somewhat seen

by Dragon_wolf



Category: Milo Murphy's Law
Genre: Angst, Gen, I'm Bad At Summaries, I'm Sorry, Tags May Change, Temporary Character Death, ghost au, no beta we die like the characters i kill, so may the summary
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:46:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 26,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27900067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dragon_wolf/pseuds/Dragon_wolf
Summary: Contrary to popular belief, ghosts don’t have to haunt the place of their death, nor do they need to hang around their killer. They do tend to get favorites though.A.K.A.“Cav, i think we just encountered a ghost”
Relationships: Balthazar Cavendish & Vinnie Dakota, Vinnie Dakota & Milo Murphy
Comments: 26
Kudos: 32





	1. Encounters

**Author's Note:**

> Today on "Ro has bad ideas": this  
> Yeah, all i have to say is sorry  
> I'm also going to play a fun prank on myself and add tags as they become relevant  
> Another fun prank would be actually finishing a non one-shot story for once  
> That'd be a riot

"This is so demeaning"

Dakota looked up from his fidgeting with kiosk levers at Cavendish's growl "what?" He prompted 

"We're respectable, educated time travelers, we could be doing something substantial, but all we're given is pistachio duty" He huffed, crossing his arms on his chest. His mustache bristled just slightly, just enough to show sharper corners than usual. 

The weather in the park was warm, the spring sun shining with just enough warmth to be comfortable and not too hot. It wouldn't stay so for long of course, once summer began the sun would become an unforgiving source of heat. How people could buy hot pistachios in this weather he didn't know "to be fair, we have not yet succeeded in saving pistachios once" He pointed out, redundantly. 

"I know! I wish we were given a chance to at least fail doing something meaningful" The taller man slumped with his elbows against the top of the cart "maybe we would even succeed then"

"Come on" Dakota mused "if we just guard this cart for long enough to ensure it's safety we might be given some important mission next" he elbowed his partner gently in the side "cheer up. What could possibly happen to this cart in the next hour"

"I guess you're right" The grey haired man sighed "not much going on here. I'm not even sure why we're needed here" 

"Hey!" A cheery voice broke them out of their shared focus. They both looked up to see a child of about 13, in slightly bedraggled but respectable looking clothes, coming towards them. He looked very cheerful and waved at them for a second. His hair drooped unnaturally, thought Dakota could not figure out why it would hang like that. He didn't dwell on it. 

"Hello" The boy greeted them "can i have a packet of pistachios please?" 

Cavendish harrumphed but begrudgingly filled a paper bag with pistachios. Dakota shivered a bit in a sudden chill breeze. The kid paid for his pistachios with a slightly crumpled paper dollar and walked away with a cheery "thank you! Have a nice day"

Cavendish looked like he was about to say something when the kickstand of their cart simultaneously snapped messily in half, sending the kiosk rolling down the gentle incline of the road with increasing speed. 

Before they knew it (and somehow before they could stop it) the cart rolled onto the road, where it was promptly smashed Into by a car. They decided not to claim it and just get out of the timeline for the moment. 

***

Dakota couldn't help but feel that maybe it was that pistachios weren't supposed to survive till their time. Every time they came even close to doing their task something went wrong, most of the time wildly out of their control. They've had random debris that they had no way of stopping fall onto their carts or shipments, runaway cars and busses come out of nowhere, once a crate fell straight off the ship and into the ocean because of a chain snapping. Time travelers weren't really supposed to believe in fate, but maybe their extinction was simply meant to be. 

He sat up against the silo they were meant to guard for the day and sighed in frustration. If only they could get Block to understand that it wasn't their fault they always failed and pistachios just couldn't survive for that much longer. Maybe they could do something else. Not that Vinnie himself was keen on doing more actively important work, but it would make Cavendish that much happier to contribute to a greater cause. Plus maybe it wouldn't be this boring. Not much to do while guarding a silo. 

He did some people watching to pass the time while his partner tried to ensure the stability of the building. There wasn't much interesting going on but at least it was something. He could even overhear bits of conversations sometimes and try to piece together what was going on without context. 

He felt a sudden chill, like temperature dropped suddenly. He shivered in an apparent summer breeze and looked across the street to see a familiar looking kid walking along the street. He looked exactly the same as last time Dakota saw him, down to bedraggled clothing and a drooping mahogany hairstyle. He was trailing behind two other kids of about the same age, a dark skinned guy in a yellow t-shirt and a redheaded girl in jock-ish clothes. The two seemed to be engaged in conversation with each other and paying no attention to the kid behind them, who was just following silently in their step. 

Dakota felt that there was something odd in what he was seeing. He squinted slightly, trying to understand what exactly was wrong when he heard a creak behind him. He heard a tinkle of falling bolts before he saw it, and as he turned around to find out what was going on he saw that part of the silo where the metal panels connected was coming undone. He had just enough time to jump on his feet and dodge the wave of pistachio nuts spilling out of the container as they swept across the street. 

"Dakota!" He heard his partner's shout and hurried footsteps "what happened this time!?"

"I dunno, Cav" He shrugged uselessly, observing the carnage that was made of their mission "the thing just broke for no reason"

He heard a small slap and looked up to see Cavendish covering his face with his hands "why is this what happens every time" The taller man sighed quietly "it's like we're cursed"

Vinnie was inclined to agree "C'mon, let's get out of here before we get blamed for disturbance of peace or something" He grabbed onto one of his partner's sleeves and gently led him away from the pistachio spill. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the two teens from earlier make their way around the scene cautiously. There was no sign of the kid following them anywhere in the vicinity. 

Dakota couldn't get rid of the chill clinging to his skin despite the hot mid afternoon air. 

***

He suspected very strongly there was something up with the kid. He'd seen him a couple more times since the silo incident, and every time their mission went awry just before or after he'd showed up. And Dakota could swear up and down that something was odd about him, even though he couldn't see anything obviously out of place. Just the vibe he got from this child was wrong, and that clinging cold feeling that tended to accompany him was unnerving. 

He'd shared his thoughts on the matter with Cavendish. The latter instantly jumped to the conclusion that the boy was some sort of enemy agent out to sabotage their missions, which Vinnie strongly doubted. The kid never actually did anything specifically to make things go wrong, it just seemed that his mere presence was what made things go haywire. How that was possible he didn't quite know, but he supposed he could ask the boy next time they saw him. 

He didn't expect to find him where they did. 

Dakota watched as the crate they were tasked with guarding came tumbling over the edge of the waterfall and plummeted down to it’s untimely demise, where it shattered against the rocks with a loud screech of agonised metal. The series of events that led to this were unlikely to happen on their own, let alone all together, but all he could do was let out a frustrated growl. Cavendish thought that he didn’t care as much for their failures, and true, he didn’t, but it was starting to get old. He sighed and turned around to look for where his partner had gotten to.

That’s when he finally noticed him. 

The kid was a little ways away from the waterfall itself, sitting by the edge of the cliff it ran off of, turned away from the commotion. They've made a lot of noise trying to stop the cart and it's falling made a lot more, so it was doubtful he didn't notice anything, but yet he didn't seem to be aware of them. 

What in the world was he even doing here? Back in the city he would have called coincidence, but this was a bit beyond that. He still maintained that the kid wasn't working against them, but now he was really curious what was up with him. He took a few steps towards the boy before he was interrupted.

“Dakota!” he suddenly heard coming from just to his side “It’s him again, isn’t it?!” Cavendish seemed out of breath but none the worse for wear, thankfully “The counter agent!”

“I told you, i don’t think he’s working against us, Cav” Dakota sighed, for the upteenth time, as his partner jogged up to him “we’ve talked about this, he’s like 14, they don’t even hire them that young at the agency”

“That’s what they want you to think” the taller man crossed his hands on his chest, his mustache bristling. He was being ridiculous again and not seeing it, in his true fashion.

“Here’s a crazy idea, let’s just ask him” Vinnie deadpanned and continued on his way towards the boy, who was somehow still oblivious to them, despite being within earshot. “Hey, Kid?” he called out. He felt the chill again, despite the shining late summer sun but didn’t pay mind to it. He could hear Cavendish hurrying to catch up behind him.

It seems finally the child noticed them. “Hey guys!” he greeted them, turning and waving “what’s up?”

“that’s what we expected you to say” Dakota heard Cavendish grumble.

“Ignore him” he said before the man could continue. “Listen, we seem to cross paths a lot and things keep going wrong when we do, so-”

“Oh, that just happens. Stuff has the tendency to go wrong around me, it’s…” he hesitated for a few moments, troubled, looking for all the world as if he couldn’t remember what he was going to say “it’s... the way it is I suppose. Not sure why, but yeah” he looked up and smiled at them again “I’m Milo by the way, nice to meet you”

As he spoke they saw a tree spontaneously uproot itself and fall a little ways away from them. This triggered a domino of trees just falling over. Milo shrugged innocently.

“Yeah ok” Vinnie felt at least partially convinced. 

“So, kinda like Murphy’s law then?” Cavendish asked, all traces of his anger gone.

“What’s that?” Milo cocked his head to the side, causing his hair to flop awkwardly over. Dakota squinted, the feeling of oddness returning full force. 

“Oh, that would be the theoretical law stating that ‘If anything can go wrong it will go wrong’” Cavendish answered, seemingly unaffected.

“That seems like the case, yeah” Milo replied cheerfully “I didn’t know it was a law”

“So you’re not deliberately thwarting our mission?”

“What mission is that?”

“We’re time travelers from the future, protecting pistachios”

Milo furrowed his brows in slight confusion “okaaay..” he began, then suddenly brightened “But why would I wanna thwart that mission? I love pistachios!” he giggled, and it was a nice sound to hear after all of the destruction of the afternoon so far, though Dakota could swear there was something odd with it too. Like there was an undertone to it. He didn’t mention it, instead letting a smile creep onto his face.

“So you’re not working against us?” Cavendish asked again

“Not to my knowledge” the boy shrugged

“Well, thank goodness for that” the man sighed with relief.

There was a noise, like crumbling rock, and part of the ground closest to the edge of the cliff gave way. Dakota was just fast enough to grab Milo by the wrist and pull him away before the whole thing crumbled into dust and fell a long way down to join the crate they'd lost earlier. “Thanks!” Milo piped up, cheerfully, as if he hadn’t just almost plummeted to his death.

Dakota stared at his hand as he let go of the boy’s wrist. It was slick with water. 

Now that he took a closer look at the boy he saw that All of his clothing was wet. Not even wet like he’d got caught in rain, soaking wet. So was his hair. Vinnie could see small trickles of water making their way across the boy’s skin and wondered how that wasn’t annoying him. 

And there was something up with his eyes, though Dakota couldn’t place what it was.

“That was close” Cavendish huffed, worry betraying his voice “are you quite alright?” 

“Yeah, it’s ok! Happens all the time, like i said” the boy informed them cheerily

“Well it was nice meeting you” the taller man nodded his head a bit “but i think it’s time for us to get going. We still have to send in the report of why we weren’t able to complete our mission. Again” he shot a look at Dakota

“Hey, it’s not my fault the van tipped over, is it?” Vinnie stated defensively, feeling just a bit out of it. 

“Well, good luck with you mission guys!” Milo waved enthusiastically at them as went to leave.

“See ya ‘round kid” Dakota called over his shoulder

“Take care” Cavendish called as well.

As they walked off to a respectable distance Vinnie stared at his hand again. The feeling of cold lingered around it even as the water slowly dried. How could the kid have such cold skin, in summer of all times?

A thought struck him as he mulled it over. 

“Cav?” he started cautiously.

“Mm?” his partner replied absently.

“I think we just encountered a ghost”


	2. Transparency

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Haven't you heard of 'easy to get lost and die in' woods?

Dakota could concede that Maybe he was jumping to conclusions. Sure, ghosts weren’t unheard of, but labeling a child they’ve just had a semi-pleasant conversation with as one was maybe a bit of a stretch. Not to mention quite sad. 

There might’ve been other explanations to the weirdness surrounding the kid, that much was true. Balthazar seemed to think that the ghost theory was preposterous, but Vinnie could see the small amount of concern under the mask of skepticism the other man put on. The whole idea sent a chill down both of their backs, whether it was true or not. 

Dakota found that he liked the kid, and the thought of him being dead saddened him to no end, which made little sense if he thought about it for too long. He'd never known him alive. He's had one conversation with him. 

And yet. 

That night as he lay on the couch, listening absently to Cavendish's furious typing up of their report, he tried not to think about a child soaked through with river water, oblivious to his own grim fate. 

***

The next time they saw the supposed ghost wasn't on a mission. 

It was their day off and they decided that maybe hiking would be a good way to unwind after the series of failures that was their work. The section of woods they chose was supposed to have no pistachio trees in it at all, and no people to bother or be bothered by for miles. That way they could spend a day away from the crowds of the city and with no fear of messing up their future missions. 

Of course the 'no people for miles' part came as a hit when by the end of the day they realized they had no idea where they were. It was getting dark, their map made little to no sense (Dakota suspected it hadn't been updated in years, not to mention the fact that large portions of it had no landmarks to speak of, just trees) and they had no way of telling where they'd already been. All the trees looked the same, all the bushes did too, and don't even get started on the rocks, because they all looked identical to each other. There were some animals here and there but that was no help.

Dakota stared at a squirrel as they passed by and couldn't help but smile. He was getting used to being mainly stationed in this time period, but still, every time he saw actual live animals he felt some small happiness. There weren't many of them in the time he and Cav came from, in fact he had never even seen a squirrel before becoming a time traveller, so this one, sitting high up in a tree and working on some piece of food or another, brought a sort of warmth to his core. 

He liked most animals, when they weren't attacking him of course. They didn't feel the need to lie, they didn't fight needlessly, they just lived their lives. 

Then the moment had passed. The squirrel was out of view and Dakota could once again hear Cavendish grumbling about whose fault it was that they were lost. 

Then a tree fell directly in front of them. 

It made so little noise while it was falling that they both almost walked right under it. Thankfully they were able to catch themselves and jumped back right as the ancient pine tree crashed onto the vague path they were walking with the deafening sound of splintering wood. 

Once he was sure that no other trees were going to fall on top of them for the moment Dakota sighed heavily. On the bright side the fact that they were fine saved him a trip. On the other hand he was sure getting tired of near death experiences lately. He shivered. 

"Oh hey, it's you guys!" Came a voice behind them, startling a yelp from the taller man. They didn't need to see him to recognize the boy. 

"Good evening, Milo" Cavendish said tiredly, a hand on his chest. 

"Sup" Dakota waved at the kid, noting that precisely nothing about his appearance had changed since they last saw him. He still looked like he’d just climbed out of a lake, down to the small water droplets gently dripping off his hands and face.

“Fancy seeing you guys” the boy continued, unaffected by the scrutiny “What are you doing here?”

“We could ask the same of you-”

“We were hiking and got slightly turned around” Dakota interrupted his partner.

“Oh” Milo looked at them for a moment in concern but then continued “well, I guess it’s easy for first timers to get lost here. My friends and I are camping right now and our camp is nearby, you could stay there till tomorrow?”

Dakota felt his eyebrows attempt to skyrocket up his forehead and tried his best not to let them. By the looks of him Cavendish was having the same problem. Well. Maybe this child wasn’t a ghost after all, since apparently he was having activities with other people? But-

Before the silence could continue for too long he heard Cav speak “Yeees, yes that would be quite nice of you and your friends to let us stay over” he droned awkwardly. 

“It’s not far!” the kid assured them before turning and walking off in the direction they came from “This way” he prompted them to follow

“Is this really a good idea?” Dakota whispered at his partner, hoping the kid didn’t hear.

“What, you’re still afraid he’s a ghost? Clearly he’s just a child, possibly with affinity to falling into bodies of water”

“But-”

“If we find a camp with people in it we can ask them what his deal is. If we don’t then i’m sure we can retreat any moment. Really, Dakota, don’t be so unreasonable”

"Alright fine" Dakota huffed "but if I’m right you owe me 20 bucks"

"Deal" Cavendish shrugged, unconcerned. He would be. 

The short walk to the campsite was quiet. Nothing went wrong, no trees so much as creaked, not to mention threatened to fall. The twilight of late evening was replaced with darkness of early night and against this darkness they could see a light of a campfire a little bit away in front of them. 

So the camp was real. That was good news. 

There were voices coming from the site now, just two, engaged in a slightly hushed conversation. They stopped abruptly when a branch snapped loudly under Dakota's foot. So much for that. 

"Who's there?" Called out a rougher voice. 

Vinnie expected Milo to call back and assure his friends that all was ok and he was just bringing two lost people in. He wasn't sure why he was surprised when no such thing happened. He also wasn't sure why he was surprised when, turning around, he found no trace of the boy anywhere, like he never existed in the first place.

Cavendish owed him 20 bucks. 

"It's ok" He called back, acutely aware that A this was not reassuring in the least and B his partner was just as confused as he was but hadn't snapped out of his thoughts just yet. He stepped forward, breaking through some bushes into the clearing, and continued "sorry, we got lost. We saw your campfire and.. " He shrugged uselessly. 

There were two people in the clearing and he recognized them both. They were the kids he saw Milo following when the silo he and Cav were guarding broke, the dark skinned boy, now sporting a backpack, and the red headed girl. They were looking at him and Cavendish with a healthy amount of suspicion. 

"Well" The girl started, rolling her eyes "these are the 'easy to get lost and die in' woods, soo… "

"Yeah" The guy responded "i guess the people naming it were right"

"Wait, this forest is called 'easy to get lost and die in'?" Cavendish asked incredulously, one eyebrow raised. 

"Well yeah" The girl shrugged, as if that's been obvious. 

"Excuse us, we're sorta.. Not exactly from around here" Dakota started explaining. It wasn't a lie. 

"Ah. Gotcha" The guy shot them quick finger guns and a knowing look and didn't elaborate. No one commented on it. 

"So, uh… are you here by yourselves?" The taller man asked. 

"Yeah, just us" The girl answered "there's a lodge a few miles away but i'd recommend not trying to get there in the dark. The path is not the most obvious one"

"Can we stay here? We don't have any tents packed" They didn't expect to still be in the woods by sundown. It Was supposed to be just a hike. 

"Sure and don't worry about that" the guy assured them, pulling the backpack off of his shoulders and ruffling through it "we have a spare"

Dakota raised his eyebrow but didn't comment. 

"Since we're staying, I think introductions are in order" Cavendish said and Vinnie had to stop himself from facepalming. No one talks like that "I'm Cavendish, and this is my… partner, Dakota" He stumbled over his words a little and the shorter man felt his desire to bury his face in his hands deepen. Instead he just waved awkwardly at the teens. 

"Well, I'm Melissa" The girl motioned at herself "and this is Zack" She waved in his general direction as he finally pulled the tent he promised out of the backpack. 

"Man, sometimes I forget just how bottomless this thing is" They heard Zack mutter quietly to himself. Dakota noticed Melissa stiffen slightly at his words but she remained quiet. There was some sort of sore spot in there somewhere that he felt curious about, but not enough to explore. "Anyway, nice to meet you" The boy looked up at them and tossed them the tent kit. It landed at Cavendish's feet with a soft thump which almost seemed to echo. 

"Likewise" Dakota hummed. 

***

The night air was comfortable and he could easily find it in himself to relax. After all they weren't going anywhere, they'd already set up the tent they were given, finding that it wasn't in the most new condition. There was a patched up spot, a lighter piece of fabric pasted over a hole and sewn together with an uneven hand. They didn't ask, but there was history there. 

Dakota found himself half listening to the conversation the other three inhabitants of the campsite were having while staring up at the sky. It always made him happy that the stars were the same, even in the past. They weren't as visible from the city, not here nor in their time, so secretly he was sorta happy that they got lost. They didn't lose out on anything back at their apartment, there wasn't much To lose out on. A tv and chips were not a substitute to this view, that much was obvious. 

And the company was welcome. They didn't know many people in this time, Brick and Savannah not counting, so they spent a lot of time in each other's company, whether that was on a mission or in their free time, and as much as Dakota enjoyed Cavendish's company, he was starting to sorta miss other human contact. 

There was a lull in the conversation that he paid little attention to. His thoughts had wandered back to Milo. Were these actually his friends from before he died or were these just people he'd clung to? 

There wasn't much information about ghosts discovered after this time, other than a confirmation that they were a thing. They were about as mysterious in his and Cav's time as they were now, which is to say that there was nothing concrete known about their behavior.

So why was this kid hanging around them? They didn't even know him, so why..? 

As if to answer his question a sudden, particularly sharp gust of cold wind robbed all four of them of their warmth and blew out their campfire. 

Yeah, he was definitely getting out of this 20 bucks richer. 

***

Dakota opened his eyes to be greeted by semi-darkness and a wall of light blue fabric. It took him a moment to remember where he was.

The tent was sturdier than it looked. Apparently the damage that the sewn on patches were covering was done by 'a horde of squirrels' which he didn't know was even a thing until a few hours ago, but for the most part the construction survived and was still usable. 

He could hear his time travel partner snoring very gently somewhere behind him. He smiled a bit to himself, relaxing in his borrowed sleeping bag and prepared to get back to sleep. 

There was a rustling outside the tent. 

Maybe it was this noise that woke him up in the first place. It sounded almost like footsteps, creeping by their tent. By the looks of it it was close to dawn but still dark enough for most people to sleep, so there was a vague silhouette, a shadow, on the fabric wall that he could almost write off to being a trick of the light. 

There was of course a chance that it was one of the kids they were sharing the site with, but for some reason Dakota didn't think it was. He would just peek out, make sure there wasn't an intruder nearby, and if all was well he'd just go back to sleep. Yeah, that sounded like a good plan. 

This time he wasn't surprised by the person who greeted him. 

"Hey, Dakota" Milo said quietly, in an effort to not wake anyone else up "can't sleep?" He was seated on one of the logs by the long dead campfire, poking the ashes with a stick. 

"Something like that" The man sighed, getting out of the tent and zipping it up behind him.

"Yeah, it happens" The kid gave him a tired looking smile "nothing to do about it, I suppose"

"Yeah, i getcha" Dakota sat opposite him. The air was cold and he suppressed a shiver. 

"I haven't been able to sleep much lately" the kid shrugged "Just decided to wait out the night out here I guess" small droplets of water made their way across his skin and dripped into the dry ashes and dust. 

Dakota looked over the boy once again. In the faint light of the upcoming dawn he could see that his body, what skin was visible at least, was criss crossed with hundreds of scars. They were different sizes and shapes, some reminiscent of bite marks, some of cuts, one snaked it's way from under the collar of his shirt, making a tree pattern of the Lichtenberg figure across one side of his neck. 'Lightning strike' Vinnie's brain provided, helpfully. There were so many of them, with even some faint pink-ish lines on his face. 

"You got hurt a lot" He whispered very quietly before he could stop himself. It seemed the boy didn't notice "Say" He started, a smidge louder but still in a whisper "how long have you had this 'Murphy's law' thing follow you around?"

"As long as I can remember, really" Milo answered. His brows knitted together in a troubled expression, like he was trying to remember something and failing "I… I think i've always had it"

Dakota took a deep breath. There was one other thing he wanted to ask "Listen… Do you know that you-"

He didn't get to finish. 

"Who are you talking to?" Came a whisper from behind him and he turned to see Zack peeking out of his tent, curiosity plastered clearly on his face. 

"I, uhh.. " Dakota turned back to see that he was alone at the campfire. He sighed "just… thinking out loud. Sorry I woke you"

"It's ok. I wasn't sleeping very well anyway" The teen hummed quietly and climbed out of his tent, dragging the backpack behind him by one strap. 

"I thought forest air was supposed to help fall asleep better" Dakota chuckled as Zack came to sit opposite him, almost exactly where Milo had been. He saw the boy shiver just slightly. 

"It's been a hard few months" Zack admitted and Vinnie saw him grip the strap of the backpack a little tighter "sleep is… sleep isn't easy"

"Do you wanna talk about it?" To be fair he didn't expect the boy to open up, but he couldn't not offer.

Zack looked up at him in mild surprise that quickly made way to something not unlike melancholy "i dunno. Maybe later" He hugged the backpack to his chest and came just short of burying his face in it. 

"Sure" Dakota said quietly "whenever you feel up to it" He whispered even softer. 

And he meant it.


	3. Summoning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Of spontaneous combustion and icy wind.

"Lemme get this straight, the cart, that i sent you specifically to guard, from fire mind you, how did you put it? 'Spontaneously combusted?' What were you two doing?!" 

Block wasn't a quiet man at the best of times. At his angriest he was like a cinema speaker cranked dangerously high. Cavendish had to lean away from their communicator screen. His ears rang. 

"But sir! There wasn't anything that could be done! It was because of-"

"If you try to tell me about a supposed ghost that's been thwarting your missions one more time i'll assign you an even worse job than you already have! And then reassign you again to an even worse one!" 

Cavendish cringed back in spite of himself but said nothing. It was better to bite your tongue when their boss was so angry. Maybe it'd pass sooner. 

"Anyway, when you losers are done fantasizing about spirits you have your next assignment. In three days there'll be a pistachio shipment to the local docks. Make sure nothing happens to it" The man growled at them, unkindly "Block out"

The transmission ended. Balthazar let out a breath he was holding for a bit too long. 

"On the bright side" He heard Dakota saying, a bit too timidly for his usual demeanor "we get a few days off, since the shipment isn't due tomorrow. We can have some down time again"

Cavendish sighed heavily. That was an upside, yes. A day or two off did sound nice after the atrocity of an afternoon they've had. Somewhere quiet and peaceful and without fire hazards. He fought the urge to grind his teeth about that last one. 

To be completely honest, not all of their failures could be blamed on the ghost that seemed to follow them. He couldn't even blame the ghost that much, not really. Lord knows being dead is an ordeal enough. 

He just wished to be out of pistachio duty. 

"I've got an idea" His partner said, more enthusiastically now, back in his high spirits. How much of that zeal was real and how much of it was played on to make him feel better he didn't know. Right then he wasn't particularly curious to find out, so he just nodded at Dakota to continue "we should talk to the kid. Ask him to try and stay away from the docks for a few days"

Cavendish thought about it "that seems… like a good plan, actually" He almost smiled to himself "then maybe the mission could go well for once. Brilliant!" 

"Yeah!" Dakota cheered with him. 

Cavendish stopped mid thought "But wait. How are we going to get ahold of him?" It was a fair question.

Dakota's face fell "i hadn't thought that far ahead" He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his tracksuit and looked down, brow creased in thought. 

Running into the boy by accident was all fine and good, but searching him out on purpose? That was going to require some work. 

Wait. Wasn't there- 

"I think I have an idea of what we have to do" He heard himself say almost before the thought formed. 

***

_He's cold._

_Not many things make sense anymore, and he isn't sure he could remember a time when they did. There might be gaps in his memory, though he can never quite understand what it is he forgot._

_He must have a family. He just… hasn't spent that much time with them lately. He should hang out with them more._

_He's sure he has friends. He was with them just the other day. When… when was that again?_

_Funny, he didn't think he was the forgetful type._

_He's so cold._

_There is noise in his head, almost like tv static. It makes it hard to hear things sometimes, hard to think. He isn't… sure where exactly he is. Or where he has been._

_His head isn't quite hurting, not really._

_Are there people talking? He can hear voices, so there must be. Who are they?_

_Did people always used to ignore him like this?_

_Maybe it's that water tower falling over that took their attention. That must have been it._

_He is somewhere else now. When did he get to the woods._

_His friends are here. That's nice. He loves his friends._

_And those pistachio guys are here too. He forces himself to remember their names through the fog behind his eyes._

_He can't remember last time he slept. He hasn't felt tired in… days. Or has it been months?_

_He is somewhere else again. The lodge is cozy and warm. It's dawn and his friends are packing to get back to the city._

_His veins are filled with ice._

_Was it always like this? Was it always hard to think for more than a minute before his mind went blank?_

_Was it always so cold and noisy in his head?_

_He doesn't recognize where he is anymore. He's in the city he's sure but where in the city._

_There are those guys again. Cavendish and Dakota? Is that their names? What are they doing?_

_Whatever it is they seem to be having a horrible time of it. Their cart seems to be on fire. Is it his fault? It seems like it would be. What is it that Cavendish called it, 'Murphy's law'?_

_The words make his head ring with something that isn't pain._

_He should leave before things get worse shouldn't he? Before something else catches fire._

_He's in the woods again. He doesn't really recognize the spot, but that's fine. He's sure he can find his way back._

_There is too much noise. Slapping his hands over his ears doesn't shut it out, so maybe it's just inside his head. Even so, there is more of it than usual. It doesn't hurt. He can't remember last time it hurt. But it's bad._

_He can't see._

_There isn't enough of him there to panic. But when he comes to there's enough of him to scream._

_He's somewhere new. He's staring at people he barely recognizes through the fog in his vision. His head is full of noise._

_And he's So Cold._

***

"Alright, i got the stuff!" Dakota burst in the room with a Cheshire grin plastered on his face and hands full of equipment bags. 

Cavendish gave him a look and returned to the book in his hands "what's 'the stuff'?" He asked absently. 

"Ghost hunting equipment! Some kids were selling it online and they had good reviews so i thought i'd get some. What with you know, our situation"

Cavendish gave the man a skeptical once over "is this really necessary?"

"Well I have to think of a backup plan if the occult doesn't work!" The shorter man protested "that book you're reading isn't guaranteed to have the answers, you know"

"Well, it has what we need. Should it not work we'll try something else" He conceded. 

The dark haired man looked over his shoulder "a salt circle? Really? He's not a demon you know"

"You don't know everything about ghosts and neither do I. Best do as the book says"

"Cavendish-"

"If everything's fine we'll just talk to him and remove the circle. For now we have to follow instructions" He wasn't going to argue this point any longer. This was final. And Dakota knew it. 

Cavendish scoffed "come on. Let's get this over with. I hope when you were getting 'the stuff' you didn't forget to get what I asked you to"

"You know, I'm not as forgetful as a goldfish" Dakota protested, mock-insulted. 

"Yes, so you've said"

***

Everything was going according to plan. 

They redrew the salt circle perfectly, even checked it over a few times. They burned the incenses they needed to burn. Repeated the latin chant the way they were supposed to, etc. 

So, basically, everything should have gone perfectly. 

It did not. 

The first sign of things to come was the noise. There was a static sound, like those old first televisions, mixed with a high pitched ringing that conjured a mild headache. If it didn't get any worse than this Balthazar would have been fine. 

Of course it got worse. 

Next came the wind. 

It started slow at first but quickly things around their apartment were being tossed around by the ice cold gusts. The boom fluttered out of his hands and out of his reach. Something smacked into the side of his head, not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to knock him over. 

Then there was screaming. It was a high, garbled sound that mixed with static and became a haunting mess of noise. Cavendish righted himself to see the ghost that they were looking for in the summoning circle. The boy was curled up in a tight ball. And he was wailing in agony, clutching at the sides of his head like they were going to cave in. 

Clearly the writers of the occult book they were using did not account for the safety of the one being summoned. He took a detached mental note to throw the book away at the nearest convenience, or better, burn it. 

For right now, they had a crisis on their hands that was only getting worse. And he didn't quite know how to make it better. 

"Hang on kid, it's ok!" Came Dakota's voice through the noise. He was at the child's side in a few seconds, stepping on and breaking the salt circle as he went. He threw his arms around the boy and held him. His words barely carried over the sea of noise "it's ok, it's ok, you're safe now, Milo, it's just us, i'm sorry, i'm sorry, it's ok now…"

Cavendish supposed it was his fault Milo was in pain. He suggested this method of contacting him and technically he was the one actually doing the deed, having been the one to read the chant. He felt guilt worm it's way into his chest and stay there. He was definitely burning that book as soon as he could. 

Soon his partner's soothing words took effect. The wind died down and Milo was left whimpering quietly into Dakota's shoulder. The man just held him, continuing to assure him that he was safe now, that everything was fine, that the pain had passed. It looked like it was working, with Milo slowly relaxing and becoming a little more aware. 

The boy extricated himself from the impromptu hug and looked around the room, seeing it for the first time since he got here. Balthazar almost winced when the child's gaze stopped on him. The borderline hollow eyes unnerved him. He tried not to show it much. 

Milo didn't seem to recognize them for a few moments, just staring blankly between them, before his pale features screwed up in confusion "... -kota? Caven…sh?" His voice sounded far away "Where.. where are we? How did i.. Get here"

"It's ok, kid" Dakota didn't move from his spot beside the boy, still kneeling on the floor "we brought you here. Sorry that it hurt you.. " He was trying to sound soothing but there was guilt in his voice mirroring Balthazar's own. 

"Is it some sorta future thing?" Milo asked, looking at them both a little bleary "teleport or… something? And what do you need me for, I thought you were saving pistachios?"

"That's sort of what we wanted to talk to you about" Cavendish started, awkwardly "there's going to be a pistachio shipment soon, coming here, so, we thought we could ask you to stay away from the docks for a little while...?"

The boy didn't appear to be listening "is this a salt circle?" He reached out to the offending image and smudged the line closest to him a little "I thought those were for demons and ghosts, did people learn to teleport with them or something?"

"It… It is just for ghosts and demons" Dakota confirmed before Cavendish had the chance to open his mouth "that is the second thing we wanted to speak to you about"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I gave up and wrote an actual outline of the plot. It's in pencil on most of both sides of an A4 paper.  
> God help me.


	4. Adrift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things tend to get worse before they get better

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for drowning I guess? Skip from the first time you see '***' till the second time you see it.

Deep and restless confusion crossed Milo's face, making Vinnie vince, just slightly "what do you mean?" The boy asked, cocking his head to the side, not so much curious as worried about what he might find out. 

Vinnie wanted to speak but no words came. He wasn't sure when this became the plan, but now he couldn't back out of it. He knew what he had to tell the boy, but how do you phrase that? He didn't want to sound insensitive or blunt, but for the life of him he couldn't find the correct words. He looked over at Balthazar, silently pleading for help, but was met with the same sentiment from his partner. 

"Wait" Milo spoke before either of them found their voice, startling them out of their panic "you… you mean, this… this is a legitimate summoning circle?" He looked at Dakota, and, receiving a nod from the man, continued "and… and you summoned me with one?" Another nod "s-so… " Oh lord, he was panicking now, causing the stutter "am… am I...?" He looked at both of them in turn, begging for them to deny his conclusion, to explain that it was something else and he wasn't… 

"I'm sorry" Was all that Dakota managed and saw the boy recoil. Christ, they couldn't have failed at this worse if they tried. 

Milo was shivering now, hugging his arms to himself and just… staring ahead. His eyes looked hollower than even before and his whole frame seemed to waver. His features read distress. 

"Hey-" Cavendish attempted but was interrupted. 

"No" Milo said quickly and quietly, with force behind his voice that was absent before. 

"What?" Dakota asked, cautiously, aware of a temperature drop that was happening in the room. 

Milo looked up at him, and there was denial in his eyes "no" He repeated simply, his voice echoing unnaturally "no, no, I don't… I can't be… no" He clutched at the sleeves of his shirt, his already white knuckles straining "I… c-can't be… "

"I'm so sorry, Milo, but-" The taller man tried again but was denied once more. 

"No!" The child repeated, louder now "I'm not… dead" The last word came out weaker than everything else and caused his pupils to shrink to pinpricks. He was shivering violently now, and by the looks of it fighting off sobbing too. The room temperature dropped some more as the ceiling light flickered "I'm… i'm not" His voice strained, as if the words caused him physical distress. And maybe they did. 

Dakota reached out to put what he hoped was a reassuring hand on the kid's shoulder but the boy recoiled violently away from him as soon as his palm touched the soaked through vest. The water left on his hand robbed him of any warmth he might've had and he absently held it close to his chest. The boy looked at him, bewilderment and fear etched on his face, as he backed away. He hated seeing him like this. 

The lights flickered again and then, with a deafening crack, gave out, plunging the room into pitch darkness. For a moment Dakota could hear the static from before, mixing with the wooshing of the wind outside before there was complete silence. 

***

Milo was somewhere he didn't recognize again. This didn't concern him as much as the fact that he didn't remember how he got there. 

There were too many thoughts in his head, and most of them shouted denial at him and it hurt. There was ringing in his ears and it hurt so much and why was he shivering so badly. 

There were people around. He tried to get their attention but they didn't seem to notice him. A static noise behind his eyes scraped out the words that they couldn't see him. He dismissed the thought. 

Where was he again? It looked like a ship. How did he get here? 

There were people yelling something and the _noise of water._

_He can remember the sound. The rushing water in his ears and the noise of a scream dying in his chest as he tries to breathe. But all there is is water._

He shook his head. A loud squeal of tortured metal made him look over in time to see a chain tying down cargo snap. 

A sudden movement of the ship tossed him to the side and he clung to the railing as the storm rocked the vessel like a breeze would a paper boat. The crate with it's chain gone missed him by a meter as it came tumbling overboard. He looked over to see it land in the water, the violent waves engulfing it in seconds before reaching up for him. 

_He can't fight off the waves as they pull him down._

He pushed himself away from the railing, trying to regain his balance on the boat. He couldn't remember how he got here but he desperately wanted to be away from there. 

_When his face breaks the surface again he can see the clear night sky staring uncaringly back at him._

He couldn't breathe. 

_There's water in his lungs._

He wanted to be with his friends. 

He couldn't tell when he'd gotten to the mall but he was relieved. He saw Zack just a moment ago and he called out to him, sagging in relief when the boy looked over in his direction. 

He stared right through him then returned to what he was doing. No amount of calling got his attention again. 

_The sound is back and he can't see anymore._

He chased down Melissa as she ran errands. She didn't see him either. A passerby walked right through him as he tried desperately to get her attention. 

_His lungs are burning._

There might have been tears on his face, he couldn't tell. His eyes stung as he suppressed a sob, the sound echoing unnaturally. He slapped his hands over his mouth to prevent more noise but it didn't work. 

He looked up, coming face to face with a mirror. The hollow eyes of a spirit stared back out at him.

***

It was eerily quiet as Dakota surveyed the damage done to their apartment. The main light they had was gone, with the glass of the lightbulb scattered in the dim shine of a desk lamp. 

It took them a few minutes to realize Milo had gone after he had, leaving chaos in his wake. It wasn't his fault, of course, they were the ones who caused him an amount of distress in the first place. 

Dakota found that some of their furniture collapsed under it's own weight, the bolt holding it together rusted through and splintered into fragments. Some of Cavendish's book collection suffered water damage and had their pages scattered. Their communicator link with the future had fallen over, despite having previously been nailed to the floor (thought thankfully it was undamaged, just slightly dented). 

There was a ruined salt circle on their floor. They didn't feel well enough yet to sweep it up.

Dakota slipped off his tracksuit, hanging it on one of the remaining chairs to dry. This was gonna be a long evening. 

***

He first felt the cold again as he was screwing in the replacement light bulb. There was a chill creeping against the back of his neck that, had he not known better, he would have attributed to a draft. But he had known better. His eyes darted around the room as he fought to balance on the top of the stepladder. 

There. In the corner, there was something weird. It was like a heat haze, except the only thing he felt looking at it was cold, and at the same time like a fog. He could see right through it, but he thought it made a familiar silhouette against the darkness. 

"H-hey" He whispered, getting down from the ladder. The fog reacted by shrinking back further into the corner "hey, it's ok" He raised his hands up in front of himself in a placating manner "it's alright"

The silhouette didn't move but seemed to take more shape, become more tangible. It was shivering, just a bit. 

"Milo, i'm sorry that things are like this" The man continued, with what he hoped was readable sympathy in his voice "we didn't mean to hurt you"

" **It's… it's ok** " Came the boy's reply, more rustling of wind than a voice " **It's… hard to think** " 

"I'm sorry"

" **Not… your fault** "

The boy, now that he was visible, at least somewhat, looked out of it. There was a tiredness in his eyes. Vinnie understood that mood. 

"How are you feeling?" He asked, not finding anything else to say. 

" **I don't know. I don't know why i'm here** " Milo confessed " **I just… didn't have anywhere else to go, I don't think** " He turned his gaze to the floor sadly " **Noone else can see me** "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think i'm getting sick.  
> I hope this chapter is ok, because honestly I keep rereading it and not liking what I see but having no idea how to fix it.


	5. Ferns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was a single shenanigan. Technically more of a hijink

" 'Kota, I'm back, how's it… going" 

Cavendish paused midstep, lowering his voice as he did so. The corners of his mouth twitched up for a moment. 

His partner was in a semi-upright position on the couch, leaning against one of the armrests, snoring gently as the tv played a rerun of some series or another quietly opposite him. The man looked like he had been trying his best to stay awake, with his hand holding his head almost upright, but failed and fell asleep anyways. 

The floor was notably glass and salt free and there was a new lightbulb in the place of the shattered one. He was glad that the mess was mostly dealt with now. 

He walked quietly past the scene, trying to make as little noise with the grocery bag as he could to set it in the kitchen to be dealt with some other time, flipping the light switch off on the way. It was late. Maybe it was time to turn in for the night… 

" **Hey...?** "

The echoing voice almost made him jump. He stifled a yelp of surprise and turned around. In the semi-darkness of the living room, illuminated partially by the tv, he could see a vague human-ish shape just over the back of the couch. It was looking at him with eyes that weren't really there. 

"Hello again, Milo" The man breathed out, putting a hand to his chest for a moment. 

" **I'm sorry for scaring you** " The ghost answered, with what could possibly be interpreted as embarrassment in his voice, if it could even be called a voice. It was hard to tell in the dark but he appeared to not be fully there, which might have had something to do with it. 

"That's alright, my boy" Balthazar assured him "why are you here? Was there anything you wanted?"

" **I don't quite know** " Milo answered sadly " **I don't really have anywhere else to go, so… I just wound up here again** "

"Are you feeling better?" He didn't want to replace the lights again. 

" **Yes, a bit. I'm sorry I caused a racket earlier** "

"You were in a bad way. That's understandable" That and the fact that Cavendish suspected the boy could not control the chaos surrounding him in any way "you didn't receive the best news at the time"

" **Yeah** " There was a short pause filled with a gentle rustling of wind outside before he spoke again " **Listen, I already spoke to Dakota about this, and… would it be ok for me to stick around here a while?** "

Cavendish blinked "how so?"

" **I'm not sure myself, I haven't… figured everything out yet, but could I… I guess haunt you guys for a little bit? I promise I won't get in the way of anything** " It was hard to see, partially because he was more fog than anything else, but the boy seemed to be fidgeting with his hands nervously. 

It was odd to hear a ghost asking permission to haunt someone. That was something that one would never hear about in ghost stories "Ok, why?"

" **Like I said, there… isn't really another place for me to go at the moment. You two are the first people to actually, really speak to me in… months, I think? I don't really remember, I…** " He seemed to get lost in thought, his non-voice becoming even more distant than before. 

"Well… ok, I suppose. If you're sure you want to be here, then… stick around" Cavendish was honestly pretty lost at the moment but he found himself agreeing anyway. Chances were the ghost already had Dakota's permission, so really he didn't have much of a choice. 

" **Thank you** " Balthazar felt a cold wind rush past him for a moment before it was gone, taking the foggy silhouette with it. 

Apparently he'd just given a ghost permission to haunt their house. He really wasn't sure what to think about that. 

He reached over the back of the couch and draped a throw blanket over his partner, turning the tv off along the way. The day had really gone on too long. 

***

The next few days were… interesting. Balthazar had thought it odd for their new ghost acquaintance to be hanging around their apartment. He didn't know the rules that spirits had to follow, but one would expect their haunt to be something important to them, not the one bedroom apartment of people they've never met in life. 

Although apparently he and Dakota were the only people who appeared to see the boy, so that might have had some part in his decision to stick around. 

Not that he minded terribly much. Other than the occasional draft and a fallen over book things seemed to be as they usually were. The time travelers went on missions as they usually did and when they were at home they occasionally had someone else to bounce ideas off of. And for his part Milo was a nice conversation partner when he was around, which wasn't always. A lot of the time the only clue to his presence was an oddly cold corner of their living room, which the ghost seemed to take a liking to for whatever reason. There was a rocking chair there now, just for him. 

Their pistachio missions weren't getting on much better than before. Apparently that shipment they were waiting for never came, something in the report about an unexpected storm and losing it along the way. For once Block couldn't get angry at them for failing their task. He settled for mild irritation. 

The other missions… they still didn’t go well. A pistachio warehouse collapsed in on itself during a checkup, almost burying them along the way, just a day after the failed shipment. Luckily no one got hurt, but Cavendish failed to see how the two of them could have prevented it from happening. 

So when they got word of a mission that didn't require them to prevent extinction of the god forsaken nuts they were almost relieved. Almost being the key word. 

"So, we're to retreat the seeds of a… " Cavendish squinted, reading the name of the plant out slowly "...Dicroidium zuberi... " His eyebrows knitted together as he tried to speedread the information about it given in the file. 

"Wazzat?" Dakota asked absently, laying the length of the couch opposite him.

"It's an extinct fern that existed during the Triassic period of the Mesozoic era" Balthazar read "apparently they theorize that it had some chemical in it they have a use for"

"And the closest one is in the Mesozoic era?"

"Yes. We're given coordinates and a time window in which these ferns can be found and we just have to retrieve the seeds"

"Sounds simple enough" Dakota mumbled

"It should be, yes" the taller man humed “barring any unforeseen circumstances” It felt almost ominous saying the words, but they seemed innocent enough at the time.

“Don’t jinx it” his partner whispered without thinking.

***

“Sooooo” Dakota started, a bit too nonchalant, climbing out of the car, having to force open the door “what went wrong?”

“I don’t know" Cavendish replied, nervously “it says that we’re in the right time coordinates, but the location seems to be off” he flicked one of the glass displays in slight agitation “something happened to navigation, also… possibly to the engine” he looked up through the windshield to see his partner flipping open the car hood “can you see anything?” he called.

“Seems mostly ok” Dakota called back, offhandedly “nothing too out of the ordinary, though I think the engine might’ve overheated” there was tinkling of fingernails on metal “the cooling system seems to be fine, so I dunno what’s wrong” he looked out from behind the hood and shrugged.

“I suppose we’ll have to wait to travel again” the taller man sighed “in the meantime we should try to complete our mission. We haven’t landed too awfully far” he got out of the car, dusting himself off automatically.

“Might as well not waste time” his partner murmured, shutting the car hood back down.

“Right” Cavendish straightened his posture and scrolled to a map on his communicator. He squinted at it for a moment, figuring out which way they were supposed to be going “i think we’re going….” he paused for a moment, then looked up and pointed “there, that way”

“Mhm” Dakota hummed back at him, looking in the general direction he was pointing.

***

The scenery was odd. Unfamiliar wasn't quite the word for it. There weren't actually trees when he looked at it, they were almost tree shaped but the leaves were wrong. It was quite foreign. 

There were no animals so far, possibly scared off by the racket of their car crashing into the ground. That was a good thing, they really didn't need any run ins with the local wildlife. There Was distant chattering of insects and some other noises of questionable origins, which wasn't exactly reassuring. 

He could hear Dakota's rustling footsteps a little bit behind him as he lead the way. The landscape wasn't easy to navigate, lacking any specific landmarks they could see. 

The walk wasn't too far, thankfully. After some 20 minutes they could see the 'grove' (if you could call it that) of the ferns they were looking for. 

In all honesty they looked boring. Cavendish couldn't help but be sort of disappointed by the whole thing so far. Sure they were doing something new, but they were basically just fetching something for their boss because they were apparently the closest agents they had to this time and place. And so far nothing has actually happened. He sighed. 

"These the ferns we're lookin' for?" Dakota asked from by his shoulder. 

"Yes, should be" He answered

"Aren't ferns not supposed to have seeds?" The shorter man asked, unprompted.

"Sorry?"

"Isn't that their whole thing? They don't have seeds yet?"

Cavendish just stared at him for a moment, out of his depth “You think they sent us wrong information?”

“Nah, I was just askin” the man shrugged “I’m sure they know what they’re asking. Mister Block can be mean but I doubt he’s be That mean”

“I suppose you’re right" He sighed again

“I say go look around if you can spot what we’re asked for, i’ll stand on lookout here” Dakota suggested

“Why?”

“In case any wildlife decides we’re interesting” the man deadpanned. Cavendish could concede this was a good thought.

“Sure. I’ll be right back” as soon as he found what they needed, which was a slightly daunting task, on the account of not really knowing what it looks like.

It took some time. Ferns are a tricky thing, they look like trees from afar but they really aren’t. 

Wandering in this ‘grove’ on not-trees was nice, actually. They weren’t short for time so he could just look around for a bit. There was almost no noise, a still covering the whole area. Peaceful really. Nice.

Well. Till there were footsteps behind him. 

“ ‘Kota, did something happen?” he asked, turning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did research for this chapter, I'll include what I learned, you cannot stop me  
> I have no gauge as to how much biology knowledge people normally have, so ya :)))  
> The curse of never getting past chapter 4 has been broken at last! I actually finished chapter 5 for once!!!!
> 
> P.S. I am physically unable to end chapters like a human being, I hope you can forgive me.


	6. Fire sale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which fern facts and bets are exchanged.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> General blood warning, I guess? Tread lightly.

“I say go look around if you can spot what we’re asked for, I’ll stand on lookout here”

“Why?”

“In case any wildlife decides we’re interesting”

“Sure. I’ll be right back”

Dakota stared at his partner as he headed to the fern grove. The ‘trees’ stood still and graceful as the man disappeared behind them.

“Really tho” he wondered out loud “aren’t they supposed to not have seeds?”

“ **I think these ones do. There were some that are supposed to be extinct** ” came a voice from somewhere to his side

“How do you know that?”

“ **I think someone told it to me as a fun fact once. Don’t remember who though** ”

“Odd thing to tell someone out of nowhere”

“ **You’d be surprised** ”

Dakota chuckled to himself. The wind by his side seemed to giggle as well.

“ **I’m sorry I crashed your car** ”

“It’s ok. It’ll be fine, just overheated a tad” the man shrugged

“ **I don’t know how I came with you** ” the voice sounded embarrassed “ **I didn’t mean to** ”

“I didn’t know ghosts could even time travel” Vinnie offered “learn something new every day” There was a laugh to his side again, more a tinkle of ice than anything. He felt himself smile “It’s ok, Milo, don’t worry about it” the wind rustled in agreement.

The boy wasn’t all there, more person-shaped fog. This seemed to be how he mostly appeared now. Though on the bright side he seemed to be doing better, having people to talk to and whatnot. 

“ **Why do you even need these ferns?** ”

“Apparently they think there’s some chemical in it they need” Vinnie hummed, unconcerned “they don’t tell us much”

“ **Sounds fun** ”

“It is” Dakota shrugged “We used to try to guess what they do with the things we fetch”

“ **Did you have bets?** ”

“Sometimes, why?”

“ **I think people at school used to bet on what disaster would happen. Just a thought I guess** ”

“Mmm” Vinnie nodded “Fun. Our bets used to be way off sometimes. Not enough info does that. Like that time we tried to predict what in the world they needed a trilobite for”

 **“What did they need it for?** ”

“My bet was research. Cav’s was a weapon. It turned out someone really wanted one as a pet”

“ **They had you get an animal from forever ago in the past just because of that?** ”

“Apparently so. Stupid, I know, but it is what it is”

“ **Fun. Do you still make bets?** ”

“Rarely. Pistachio runs all end the same and we know why we’re doing them”

“ **Fair** ”

“If we start getting normal missions again we might just revive the tradition.”

“ **I’ll bet this mission ends well** ”

“You know that’s vague as all get out?”

“ **Yeah, I’m aware. Still gonna bet on it** ”

“Well, I think someone is gonna get chased by a dinosaur”

“ **That’s grim** ”

“The way these things tend to go I’m sure something along the lines is sure to happen”

“ **I hope it ends ok** ”

“I’m sure it will”

“ **Why specifically dinosaur chase?** ”

“I dunno, sounds exciting to be chased by a T-rex”

“ **I don’t think they’re around yet, wrong era** ”

“Did someone tell you that as a fun fact too?”

“ **Nah, I think I read that one somewhere myself** ”

“Ah” Vinnie raised an eyebrow but continued “But anyway, time travel is weird. I think there were incidents with sending a t-rex to your time before, so I’d be careful”

“ **Really? I’ll take note** ”

“Yeah, apparently one was flung into a museum once. Dunno who was responsible for that, but it seemingly worked itself out”

“ **Lucky** ”

“Yeah, they didn’t even need to send anyone in to deal with it. Most people didn’t even notice”

“ **How do you not notice a giant dinosaur?** ”

“People are surprisingly oblivious when it comes to time travel mistakes. Makes it easier to do cleanup when someone screws up”

“ **That’s good, I guess?** ” he sounded mildly conflicted “ **I mean, would be bad to cause a panic by accidentally leaving a car in the middle ages** ”

“Yup”

“ **Did that actually happen?** ”

“Not to us, but I’ve heard of it”

“ **Neato** ”

“Right,” Dakota smiled “We did bring a saber tooth tiger to our time once though. That was a riot”

“ **How did you manage that?** ”

“Well, you see-”

But he was interrupted by a shrill scream coming from the direction of the ferns, followed by what could be described as a roar of something big. In fact, it was probably just that.

“I think you owe me 10 bucks” Dakota called over his shoulder, already running.

“ **I don’t own money** ” the wind racing past him whispered in a sound of tinkling ice.

***

If this was the first time this happened Dakota would probably break down. In fact he did do just that, some years ago, relatively speaking. As things were currently he could only sigh. 

God there was so much blood though, which was honestly understandable. The man's top half wasn't attached to his legs. 

Good lord. What a way to go. Bitten in half. 

Good news: he was right about a t-rex. Bad news: he was right about a t-rex. Bad news part two: the T-rex was still there and eyeing him. That was a bad sign, definitely. Yeah, probably time to leg it. 

He spared himself a few more moments to look at the scene in front of him. It could have been worse? Probably. The fact that he couldn't see Cavendish's face at all was for the best. There wasn't much room to get worse though. Teeth tearing into a body tends to be messy, especially teeth that big. 

And then he turned around and retreated into the bushes at a respectable pace, hoping to dear god that the reptile would not follow. A fern crashed to the ground with a loud splintering crash behind him he thought his hopes were for naught, but when no other noise followed he mustered the courage to glance back. 

The dinosaur wasn't following him. There was no sign of it, thankfully, and he breathed out heavily. Good, great, he didn't have to sprint to all the way back to the time machine. He still walked sorta quickly, just in case, but he loathed to think he'd have to run again. 

“Milo, you around?” he asked, continuing to walk. There was a noise that may have been a sob, or maybe a branch falling off of a tree. Maybe it was both “Hey, I’m sorry, you ok?” 

There was a silence, filled with crackling of cold air, then “ **I don’t know?** ”

“Yeah, that’ll happen” he conceded “Listen, I promise it’ll be fine. I’m working on it” There was only silence in answer. Cold clung to his back “I’ll explain later. Now, I need you not to follow me. It’ll be Fine, you hear me?”

“ **...Ok** ” came a sad reply and he almost regretted telling him to stay. But he had to. What he was going to do would erase all that happened. He was the only one who needed to know. 

The cold wind dissipated and suddenly Dakota felt acutely alone. 

Well. At least he knew the boy listened. That was good. He’d tell him what was up when it was over. Probably. Maybe. Yeah.

He wasn’t sure how long it took to get to the car, which has since cooled down and was functional again, but it felt like a couple of minutes. Judging by how tired he felt it was probably longer though. No matter, that was fine. He checked that he had the ticket and the card in his pocket and started the car.

***

The car didn’t crash this time, which was an improvement. He checked and yep, he had enough time to go get Cav. Now… he had to somehow replace himself. This would be a bit difficult, on the account of a ghost accompanying him at the time.

“ **Why do you even need these ferns?** ” he heard, followed by.

“Apparently they think there’s some chemical in it they need… they don’t tell us much”

Christ. He sighed “Hey” he called, half heartedly, halting the conversation in its tracks.

“Really?” The other Dakota asked, looking exasperated and disappointed “Now? What happened?”

“Dinosaur” He deadpanned “Bit right in half. Hey Milo” he waved at the foggy silhouette that was rapidly getting more and more confused “This is fine, don’t worry about it” 

“Yeah” his past self agreed “It’s fine, don’t panic”

“ **But… what?** ”

“i’ll explain in a sec, we need to go save Cav right now. Milo, come with me, you” he eyed the other him and threw him the ticket and card in a bundle “send me a postcard”

“Aight” The other him shrugged, as if it was fine.

“The car is parked over there in the bushes, Milo c’mon” he turned and walked off, feeling a cold wind join him a few seconds later.

“ **What’s happening?** ” the ghost asked, worriedly.

“In a few minutes Cav’s gonna get hurt by a T-rex and i’m making sure he doesn’t”

“ **But-** ”

“Yes, i know they’re from a different era, didn’t stop this one though” 

There was a stunned silence for a moment, filled with crackling of ice. The ferns swayed gently with the cold breeze.

“ **Isn’t this against the rules or something?** ”

“Well, technically yes, but don’t tell Cav about it please”

“ **...Sure, ok** ”

“Thanks” speaking of “Hey, Cav! Are you almost done, we should get out” he called

The man, whom they just located some yards away, almost jumped at his call. He turned around, sighing as he spotted them “Dakota, don’t yell. Yes, I’m done” he squinted “Afternoon, Milo. I suspected you came with us, thought i can only wonder how”

“That’s what I said” Dakota chuckled, ushering the other man to just go “learn something new every day and all that” he glanced at the boy as they walked away from the danger zone, only to see him just… staring just above Balthazar’s head. He looked somewhat distressed “Hey, you ok?”

He seemed to take a few moments to register the words, at which point a sort of shiver ran over his form “ **...Y-yeah, I’m… fine** ” he answered absently “ **Just… thinking** ”

“Are you sure, you do not look that well” the taller man pointed out.

“ **Yes, I’m… I’ll be back, I need to think for a minute** ” there was a gust of wind that startled both the men and Milo was gone. The cold lingered for a moment before dissapaiting as well.

“That was… odd” Balthazar hummed

“He is a ghost, Balth. Odd is sorta expected”

“I suppose you’re right” the man sighed “I do hope he’s alright”

“I’m sure he is” he wasn’t sure, but he had hope.

***

The rest of the trip went uneventfully, which was a good thing. Dakota felt tired and was ready to turn in for the day, despite the whole mission only taking a couple hours at most. He sure had enough.

Mister Block found no reason to yell at them, thank the lord, which the man wasn't incredibly happy about but couldn't make anything up. So he just told them they did a good job and turned the link off. 

"So.. What do you wanna eat?" Vinnie asked, flopping down onto the couch gracelessly. 

"I think Chinese? How's that sound?“

"Sounds fine" He answered, not really caring. 

"Great! Be right back"

"Why do you get to order?"

"Because you'll order 3 portions for yourself again"

"Unfair" Dakota smiled up at Balthazar. 

"Deal with it" The taller man smiled back at him, leaving their apartment.

Vinnie sighed happily to himself. This was fine. This was perfect actually. Like it should be. 

A chill blew across the room. 

"You feeling better?" He asked

" **Yeah** " Milo answered, settling into the rocking chair tiredly. 

"You wanna know what was up back then, right?“

" **If you could explain, that'd be good, yes** "

He sighed "Cav is clumsy and has bad as hell luck. He has… well, he has died a whole lotta times in the past. So I did what I had to do I guess and save him. I just… kept doing it" He hoped he wasn't explaining it like an idiot, because it sounded so awkward. 

" **Oh…** " The ghost paused, somewhat distressed " **...I understand… I think…** "

"Thanks… don't tell Cav though, please, he doesn't know, he'd freak out"

" **I won't, don't worry** " He promised " **I can understand why you do it… but, isn't that sorta wrong? Don't people who do time travel have to follow rules?** "

"Yeah, no one else knows?" His face scrunched in awkwardness "If our boss found out he'd fire me in a heartbeat. Thankfully i don't enjoy following rules"

" **Why did you tell me then?** "

"Cause you saw most of it I guess"

" **Yeah…** "

"What happened back then, by the way? If you wanna talk about it?"

" **Oh, ah… I dunno… being… a ghost… is weird, I think I can see things that aren't there?** "

"Like what?"

Milo stared into space, looking like he was remembering something he really didn't like. 

"You don't have to talk about it, Milo. It's ok if you have to process it"

" **Thanks… I might need to think about it some more** "

"Sure, I'm here whenever"

***

He remembered things he wasn't supposed to. 

He wasn't sure how. But he remembered seeing blood except he didn't really? The memories were really fuzzy and felt fleeting and _wrong_ but they're there. Almost there. 

He stared at the spot above Cavendish's head. It was weird, almost like an after image? There was a foggy outline of the same man just there, but the others didn't notice it. How? Was it here? If the man was alive again why was his ghost here? 

Alive again? He… remembered him dying, in a _wrong_ memory. Something that didn't happen anymore, that he was sure he wasn't even supposed to know about really, but there it was. 

He didn't mention it at the time, as the foggy outline, very politely, asked him not to. He felt compelled. 

The fog was still there now, as Cavendish returned with their order of Chinese food. He just silently followed the man, not talking, not interacting at all. When he spotted Milo he just smiled and waved and returned to his routine. 

Milo waved too. He tried not to think about the fact that the after image seemed to have no legs, or that apparently this has happened before. 

He really wished he could sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It wasn't gonna be the t-rex death scene but now it is.  
> I mean, I was gonna to murder the man, but i was looking at different options :)))  
> Tis angst but it's funny this time, by which I mean I laughed as I thought of it and kept doing so while writing it, as apposed to being sad and almost crying while I thought up the ghost business.


	7. Futurlesness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Memory is a tricky thing. Sometimes you remember something and don't understand how you could have forgotten.

"Why did you decide to stay with us?"

Milo looked up to see Cavendish looking at him out of the corner of his eye, while also looking after Dakota. The boy stared for a moment, uncomprehending "what do you mean?" His voice didn't even echo that much this time. 

"Before we met you, you were all over the place, why do you stay with us now?" The man asked

"I… I guess I wanted to talk to someone again? Like I said… no one else can see me"

"I wonder why that is" The man wondered aloud, eyeing his partner as he tinkered with the machine he was working on "what do you think?"

"I dunno really. I didn't know you guys before"

"Mmm" The man nodded

"Could it be cause you guys are time travelers? Like, whatever rules work on ghosts, they apply differently when you mess with time?"

"That's a valid theory" The man hummed "I'm not sure how that'd work, but it seems legitimate"

Milo nodded at that. A small silence fell upon them as they watched Dakota work. 

The boy felt his features fall a bit as he thought. His mind wasn't the empty echoing cave it was a few weeks ago but that didn't mean it was fine. Now that he was properly aware of it he didn't like it. 

"Penny for your thoughts?" He heard the taller man ask. He sighed. 

"For such a long time I was just… Milo. I didn't think about anything for long enough to notice that i didn't remember anything, i didn't even notice that people didn't see me. For a long time i hung out with friends, talked to people and it didn't occur to me that no one ever replied. And now that I do see it I still can't remember enough" He wrung his hands in agitation "I don't even know who my family are. It's driving me mad"

A sudden spark of the machine took Dakota by surprise and he yelped, leaning backward away from it. When after a moment nothing more happened he sighed nervously, or maybe with relief, and went back to work. 

"Sorry Dakota!" Milo called out. 

"It's fine, just a spark" The man called back, muffled by the metal. 

"Did it always used to get worse when you were distressed?"

"What did?" Milo cocked his head to the side. 

"Murphy's law" The man said and Milo felt his head ring. 

"I don't remember. It might have but it might not have? I think it was just… around. Things just happened without warning or meaning"

"Could that be part of being a spirit as well?“

"I'd guess" The boy shrugged "like the wind and the cold"

"Yeah" The man hummed "why is that I wonder? What are the cold and wind connected to?"

" **I'm cold** " The boy whispered in a voice that wasn't his. 

"Sorry?" The man asked, leaning just a bit towards him, presumably to hear him better. 

"I-ah" The boy breathed, trying to think, but his ears were full of noise. He shook his head in an attempt to get rid of it "I… I think that's the last thing I felt. I can't… really remember, but there was water and it was cold"

"I see" The man frowned. Milo acutely felt the water droplets making their way across his skin. They felt the same temperature as his body "so… you drowned?"

They both winced. 

"Wait, i'm sorry, i didn't mean-" Cavendish spluttered hurriedly, but Milo just shook his head again. 

"It's ok, it's..." He didn't know if it was actually ok. He didn't feel mad at the man, but the… the idea made the noise in his ears louder "it's fine" He tried to state, but didn't feel sure enough himself "I… I think I did, I can't… remember the whole thing. Only bits and pieces" He confessed "the cold water, the waves, the… sky, the lights" the pain, the burning, the noise, the pain, the pain, the pain, the-

"Milo?" The man sounded worried and it took some concentration to snap out of his thoughts "are you good?"

" **No, I'm…** " Oh god he could see through his hands again, and his voice wasn't his, and the cold seeped into his blood, which he didn't even have anymore-

Something in the machine sparked again and it promptly disassembled itself completely. Dakota stumbled and fell backward onto his hind, looking baffled "that's one way to do it" He mumbled before looking over at them. 

"Milo, please calm down" Cavendish tried to sound soothing "it's ok, it's over. Try to breathe"

Well. He would. If his lungs weren't full of water. His hands gripped his shoulders in a way that would hurt if he could feel pain. It was so cold, he could almost hear the ice crackling through the noise in his ears. 

"Milo, it's alright, please" He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up to see a tall silhouette above him. He forced himself to recognize it as Cavendish through the _Noise_ "hey, come back, ok? It's safe now. Trust me, it's ok, you're not there anymore" He sounded reassuring. Maybe he was right "trust me, it's alright, it's ok" The man smiled at him and Milo found himself believing. 

The noise in his head calmed and he felt himself shivering. He felt more… present now.

"Th-thank you" He stuttered out "i'm sorry"

"It's alright, my boy" The man hummed at him "things happen, and that's ok. Let's talk about it some other time, yes?"

"Y-yes, thanks" The boy almost sobbed. 

"Dakota, are we done here?“ the taller man asked. 

"Yeah" Dakota answered, looking slightly worried. He'd stayed some distance away, presumably to not get in the way "This thing can't hurt anyone if it's disassembled. We just needed to turn it off but this is better"

"Great. I think we should go home now"

"Agreed. Block should not be able to get angry at us this time, since we did what we had to" The man shrugged. 

Milo shivered. This was good, this was ok. He was fine. Well, he wasn't, but… no he was fine. He didn't have to think about it. It would be fine. 

"Thanks" He whispered. 

***

The ghost behind Cavendish was gone two days after it appeared. At some point it just faded out of existence and the space behind the man's back was empty once more. Milo didn't know what to think of it. 

He thought about whether or not he should tell Dakota about it. He wondered why the ghost was there in the first place. Or why it disappeared. 

He wondered why He was still around. 

There was that theory that ghosts stuck around when they had unfinished business, but in all honesty he failed to understand what he was supposed to actually be doing. 

He didn't feel tired, he didn't know he could be, but he did feel weary. He found that more often than not he was cold, and no heat helped. It seemed he actively robbed things of their warmth without actually feeling any of it. 

At least he had people to talk to now. 

He liked the time travelers. They were really odd but fun to be around and he was glad he met them. They seemed to be content with him haunting their house, which sounded funny when he thought about it. In most stories about this sort of stuff people actively try to get the ghost to leave. 

He wondered if anyone would ever know of him. Of the fact that he did haunt people, and that he was… whoever he was. He wondered if people who knew him in life would ever know what became of him. 

Or if he would ever know what became of him. 

He really wished he could remember his family. 

Once Cavendish asked him if he had a surname that he knew. That day some of their floorboards caved in. 

He felt bad for his mood swings and their destructive nature. He didn't know how to control it at all and he didn't know if there was a way to do so but still he felt like wasn't doing enough to help. Maybe if he kept his thoughts under control, or if he left, it would be- 

He noticed his hands slowly become see-through. He shivered and pulled himself out of the thought spiral. 

It was a weekend. The air outside was hot, or so he was told, and the day called on people to be lazy and stay in and do not much of anything. People relax during days like these. 

So his new friends were doing just that. Dakota was laid out on the couch reading something or rather with a slack expression and Cavendish was working on something on their laptop. Milo just elected to stay in his little corner and think, try to rest as well. He couldn't really rest of course but he did the closest thing he could. 

It was odd when he thought about it. The whole idea of his predicament. He was here but he was also somewhere else. At the bottom of some body of water. And yet he was still around, present enough to talk, to think, but not enough to really Be there. To even properly affect the environment. The rocking chair under him moved just slightly when he settled into it but any person other than the two time travelers in front of him would not be able to tell anyone was in it. He could hold things but somehow people never noticed it. 

He looked over his hands. The cold skin was criss-crossed with a pattern of faint pink-ish lines. He remembered some of them. He knew the semi-circle of small crescent moons at his left forearm was a seal bite. He knew the diagonal nick on the back of his right hand was done by an edge of a street sign. He knew the criss crossed scratches at his right elbow were raccoon claws. 

But there were some he didn't recognize. Not too many, but enough. He sighed and dropped his hands into his lap uselessly. He knew there were others. His whole body was covered in a patchwork of scars, some of them more involved than others, some that he remembered and some he didn't. The lightning scars, one on the side of his chest and going onto his shoulder and neck, the other diving down his back, the slashes across his middle, the countless lines across his shins. He wondered how he managed to live as long as he did. 

His head didn’t hurt, it never did, but it buzzed lightly as he tried to think of something else.

***

“Hey, Milo?” he heard Cavendish call him and refocused his mind on the present. The man looked serious, poised over the small laptop in a controlled manner, his voice level “Could you come over for a moment?”

“Sure” the boy answered, climbing down from the vast rocking chair and walking over. He peeked over the man’s arm onto the screen.

“I had an idea and thought to look around the missing person’s reports for the last year to maybe see who you were?” Cavendish offered.

“Ah, smart” Dakota commented, putting his book down and paying attention to them now.

“Not exactly. I’m surprised we haven’t thought of it sooner”

“Well, it hasn’t been that long since we would have had the reason to”

Milo didn’t really listen to them. He was staring at the page quietly.

Milo Murphy.

He would laugh if he wasn’t quite as speechless.

Missing since November 20th, still considered missing. Huh. Has it been that long?

There was an address in the contacts. He recognized it. He had to go.

***

The two men felt when the ghost left them. It was an abrupt stillness in the air, the oppressing cold dissipating in a moment. They shared a worried glance.

A mug of tea that was warm enough to be comforting just a minute ago fell from its perch, spilling it’s ice cold contents over the floorboards.

***

How could he ever forget? It seemed so blindingly obvious now, and being where he was felt just so _right_ , how could he ever forget? 

His room was basically the same as he remembered it, give or take a couple of small details, but those always changed. He felt himself smile and laughed, a sound that was almost normal, _human_. He missed his home, even if he didn’t know it at the time.

There was a pitter patter and a sound of a door being edged open and he turned around to see Diogee staring at him. The dog looked like he was considering some things for a moment, sniffling the air curiously. Milo smiled at him and crouched down to his level, holding his hands out to his pup “C’mere, boy!” he called. This seemed to make up the dog’s mind as he barreled into the boy at some speed, barking happily.

He hugged his puppy, almost crying happy tears and _almost_ feeling the warm fur under his fingers. The dog sniffed at him and emitted happy doggie noises, licking his cheek many times over and letting himself be pet.

“Oh, I missed you, Diogee. You don’t even know” Milo laughed, his eyes blurry. The pup barked a short high noise, his own ‘I missed you’. “How’ve you been, boy?”

The dog instricated himself from the hug and ran around Milo, barking madly, drawing crooked, excited circles with his run. The pup was about the same as he remembered him, if a tiny bit thinner, but otherwise unchanged. His happiness mirrored Milo’s own as the boy got back on his feet “Really?” He chuckled. Diogee just barked some more at him, his tail wagging like crazy “I see”

The door made another noise, opening fully and Milo looked back up. It seemed the racked they were making did not go unnoticed. “Hey, Sara” Milo breathed, overjoyed, looking at his sister through tears in his eyes. She seemed to stare at him for a moment, then just looked down at Diogee. 

“Hey, how did you get in here, boy” she addressed the dog, and Milo’s spirits fell “Come here” she bent down and scooped their pet up in her arms, holding him close. He seemed to struggle a bit, whining “I know, I miss him too” she murmured into the dog’s ear, looking blankly into the room for a moment, seeing right through the ghost “I do too” she whispered and closed the door as she walked away, Diogee in tow.

He was alone again. He didn’t know what to feel anymore. He was vaguely aware of the noise of static that filled the room. Or of his own form turning to fog. Or of the racket as the furniture around him crashed to the floor in a cacophony of noise. He sort of felt the tears in his eyes again, ice cold and comfortless.

***

He didn’t remember when he’d gotten to where he was again. All he knew was that he wasn’t home anymore, which filled him with both relief and hurt. 

He stared out over the scenery in front of him. The sunrise was beautiful. He wasn’t sure when the last time he actually saw one was. His memories were a tangled mess that made very little sense still.

There may have been tears rolling out of his eyes. They mixed with the water already there and it made little difference, other than a distant sting on his eyelids. 

He felt tired. That was new.

The grass under his hands was cold but soft. The distant sound of the river rushing past echoed in his ears but didn’t sound irritating. He was sure that if he needed sleep he would fall asleep right then and there. Alas…

Presently he just stared out at the pinkish sky. It felt nice. The sun didn’t feel warm on his skin. But that was to be expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enter Diogee! God i waited entirely too long to finally get to my good loaf puppy. He missed his boy so much.  
> Oh, and also more sad. How could I not :')


	8. Those who carried on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once more, they've left remembering  
> To the people who picked up their arms and legs  
> And carried on

It's been a few days. 

Dakota eyed the empty rocking chair in the corner with contempt. Their apartment was quiet and warm and he didn't know which part of that annoyed him. Not that he felt annoyed necessary, but there was a hint of something akin to irritation. Or something like that. 

He ran his hand over the "ghost communicator" or whatever the hell it was called. It stayed ruefully silent and lifeless. He put it back into his inner pocket. 

He turned his attention to the briefing in his hands. It was a lot like a wall of text, quite uncomfortable to read, but he got the gist. Cavendish was far better at gleaning important small details from these things and he would tell Vinnie what he needed to know. Whoever decided that making their briefings all one paragraph of small text was overpaid for their services. 

In short they had to tail a certain man, description file attached, to a cafe and then make sure a deal he participates in doesn't go through. Apparently it didn't matter how they do the last part, which was always fun to figure out. 

But it was fine. The mission sounded exciting. They'd be almost like spies, that was fun, right? Yeah. 

"Morning, Kota" Came a voice somewhere behind him and he turned to his partner with a half smile. 

"Mornin" He murmured, good naturedly "sleep well?"

"Yes, actually" Cavendish humed, looking all the better for it. 

"No more nightmares?"

"No more of those, thankfully, thought i'd say nightmare is a tad bit too strong a word for it"

"What else would you call them?"

"Just bad dream would suffice" The taller man offered

"Sure, be that way" Vinnie teased "you read over the briefing yet?"

"Yes, read it yesterday when it came in, like i was supposed to"

"Can't read when you're asleep" Dakota shrugged, defending himself "it did come in sorta late"

"No matter" Balthazar nodded to himself "we should move out soon, but there's no hurry"

“Neato burrito” Vinnie hummed, getting up off the couch "we could have a snack at the cafe we're needed at beforehand, so we don't look conspicuous walking into the joint right after the guys?“ he offered

"Sounds like a grand idea" Balthazar answered, not thinking it over for long. 

"It's a win-win" Vinnie chuckled "we get an advantage in our 'spying' and we get to snack"

"Quite" Cavendish waved him off, picking up the briefing paper and running his eyes over it again, nodding to himself once or twice as if to confirm that he remembered correctly. 

"Anything specific we need to do?" Dakota asked

"Nothing I can see" The taller man murmured, distractedly "we are given freedom in how we want to approach the situation, which is a bit vague"

"Tell me about it"

"But other than that it's cut and dry"

"Do we just… steal his briefcase or something? So the deal can't happen?“

"That is an option" Cavendish nodded "we could figure something else out on the way, buy if we don't we could always just do that"

"Neato"

"Stop saying that"

"No" 

Cavendish just glared at him. He couldn't stop himself from laughing. 

***

"I was thinking" Dakota began, leaning lightly forward on his elbows on the table "do you wanna bet on what happens this mission?"

Cavendish glanced at him over his glasses, mild suspect in his eyes "why? Do you know something I don't?"

"No, course not" Vinnie smiled his best inconspicuous smile "I was just thinking that, well, we used to do that, and now we're getting new missions again, so we should do that again"

Balthazar narrowed his eyes at him "if you're just betting on something you know is going to happen, I swear to god-"

"No, no!" The shorter man chuckled "I swear, I know nothing"

"So I've been led to believe" The taller man sighed "fine, I'm game, what do you have"

"I have a few actually" He grinned "one - 5 on the couple two tables over proposing, two - 5 on water damage in the near future and three - 10 bucks on the fact that the case we're supposed to steal has something ungodly stupid"

Cav raised an eyebrow and glanced at the people two tables over "can you clarify the second one?"

"I dunno, I just think something like a flood happens soon. With our luck, I dunno, the water main might blow within the next hour. It's just 5 bucks anyway, I'm willing to risk it"

"Fair enough, I take those and I raise you…" His brows furrowed "let me think for a second"

"Go ahead" Dakota leaned back in his chair, pleased with himself. 

"Let's see, I put a 5 on the man one table over getting overly angry and yelling at the waiter, a 5 on an animal being involved in the events of the day and a 10 on this mission somehow turning out well without our involvement"

"Huh" Dakota glanced at the man one table over "sure, I take it, thought the last one is odd to be completely honest"

"It is what it is"

"Any specific animal prediction for the second one?"

"Bonus points if it's a cat"

"Why?"

"I just like cats"

"Good point"

"Good" Cavendish hummed "same rules as always"

"Yup" Dakota nodded, returning to his people watching. 

***

They watched as the man two tables over exploded in anger and went to slap the waiter. Cavendish vinced but semed to be in a good demeanor. 

Some minutes later, while their own waitress brought them their food they watched one of the men two tables over laugh nervously as he got out of his chair and got on one knee. His partner seemed over the clouds with happiness and almost crying. Dakota counted it as a victory. 

The man they were supposed to be on the lookout for came in a little after that. He was an inconspicuous looking bloke, in an ironed two piece suit and carrying a grey, strict briefcase. He didn't look as out of place as one would think, sliding into a chair at one of the corner tables and ordering something obviously brief for the wait. Dakota spared him a brief glance, trying his best to not stare at the man outright. Cavendish seemed to be trying to do the same. 

"What's the game plan" He whispered in between taking a sip of his drink. 

"I'm still thinking" Cavendish whispered back

"So, plan A? Stealing?"

"It may have to be, but how?"

"We still have time, let's think a bit more" Dakota hummed. His eye was drawn by the entrance door opening with a glittering bell. 

He fought the urge to call out and wave as some familiar people walked in. He tried not to attract attention to himself but apparently that did nothing as they noticed the time travelers anyway. 

"Hey, fancy seeing you guys here" Zack called, slightly louder than Dakota was comfortable with in the situation. The man in the corner spared them a glance but didn't seem suspicious. 

"Hey guys" Melissa parroted, with a wave of her hand. 

"Hola" Dakota greeted them, letting himself smile at the teens. 

"Greetings" Cavendish gave them a polite smile as well "surprised to see you here as well"

"Small world" Zack chuckled "you mind if we sit with you?"

"It's aight" Dakota hummed, not actually sure if it was alright. Cavendish just nodded, a bit unsure himself. 

"Great" Melissa pulled up a chair for herself beside Dakota "so, this a date or?"

Cavendish nearly did a spit take. Vinnie repressed an embarassed cough. 

"Mel, what in the world?" Zack exclaimed. 

"What? Just curious" She shrugged, feigning innocence. Dakota laughed nervously and hoped they could just laugh it off. Cavendish looked away unconfortably "joking, joking, your secrets are safe with me" She winked at them, and Vinnie could only stare soundlessly.

"Annnyyway" Zack continued, trying to sidestep the embarassed silence "how have you been?"

"Been well" Vinnie murmured, shaking himself out of his thoughts "working, resting, the usual"

"Yes, it's been quite… routine" Balthazar chimed in, a little disappointedly "and you?"

The teens shared a look "been ok, honestly could have been better" Zack shrugged. 

"Have you been able to sleep?" Dakota asked, before he could stop himself. 

Melissa just shrugged again. Zack looked away for a moment. Touchy subject, huh. Oof. "Sorry" He murmured, mostly to himself, being rewarded by a nod from Cav. 

***

All in all, the evening was going well. After a rather awkward start they were able to start a more or less warm chat flow, all the while they were able to keep an eye on their man on the corner table. He wasn't fidgety, he wasn't nervous, just waiting, reading something or rather on his phone. There was still time to figure something out, but it was getting short. 

He shared a look with Balthazar. The man nodded in the vague direction of the man and raised an eyebrow. Vinnie shook his head, just slightly. No ideas. 

Balthazar sighed. He was looking more and more worried by the moment. Hopefully their company wouldn't be able to tell. 

"Hey, uh, you good?" Zack cocked his head to the side. Of course, ignorance was too much to hope for, obviously. 

"Y-yes, I'm quite well, my boy" Cavendish nodded "I'll be right back, excuse me" he got up and hurried away before anyone could say anything. Everyone followed him with their eyes. 

"Since we're having a break" Mel got up as well "i'm gonna be right back as well. Don't miss me" She winked at Zack and walked off. Zack just smiled at her for a moment. Then his face fell, just a bit, but enough to notice. 

He looked weary in general. It was barely noticeable when he smiled, but now it was at full display. The bags under his eyes betrayed that no, he did not sleep well recently. The backpack was ever present, now resting at his feet in all its raggedy glory. The boy looked thoughtful. 

"Penny for your thoughts?" Vinnie asked, startling the teen out of his thoughts. 

"Yeah, sorry, just…" He tried to make some gesture with his hands but gave up half way through "i don't know"

"I getcha" The man hummed, soothingly "things are difficult"

"Yeah" The boy sighed "I'm just tired, you know? There's… something, that happened, a while ago, and I don't know why it happened, but I can't help but think it's somehow my fault. I know it's not, with my head I know, but even so I just… "

"Can't help it?" Dakota offered. The teen nodded, looking a bit defeated "I feel you. It's hard, but it'll get better" He hoped at least. That's what he told himself. 

"Yeah, I hope"

***

The time was almost up and they still hadn't done anything for their mission. Both the time travelers were getting sorta fidgety. They saw no opening they could take, the man didn't move from his spot, just waited dutifully for his client. They hadn't drawn any attention from him, which was good, but it was almost time, which was bad. 

"You two sure you're alright?" Melissa asked, eyeing them suspiciously. 

"Yeah, peachy. Just work thoughts, nothing for anyone but us to worry about" Dakota reassured them. He wasn't even lying. 

"If you say so"

There was a chime of the door. Vinnie glanced at it briefly, then did a double take. 

There was not a person going through the door. There was a dog. 

It was a little, yellow-ish cream coloured animal with brown cow spots. It was quite cute and compact. 

The question was what was it doing there? 

Vinnie was gonna call out to it. Someone did ut for him thought. 

"Diogee! There you are" Mel called out to it "where've you been? Your family was worried for you" She cooed

The dog barked once, making its way towards their table happily. 

A few things happened after that. 

One, there was a loud noise, followed by a shout, that startled everyone in the cafe. 

Two, there was a heatwave as something definitely exploded in the semi-open kitchen. 

And three. Some things caught on fire. It was hard to tell what exactly. But there was screaming and people ran. Someone ushered Dakota to also move, he wasn't sure who, but he did that. He caught out of the corner of his eye the man they were spying on beating the fire out of his briefcase. He appeared to lose the battle however and retreated, without the case. Vinnie smiled smugly. They did their job. Nice. 

***

No one got seriously hurt in the grill explosion, which was both lucky and amazing news. Also amazing news was that their mission was a success. 

Dakota felt just a tad out of it, apparently a lot of people were. Their little party moved from outside the cafe to a park or something like that and were just hanging out there now. That was cool. All 6 of them. 

Wait, 6? 

Two adults. Two teens. A dog. A ghost. Six.

Ah. He saw the problem now. He waved mildly at the fog that hung around them nervously. 

The two teens were busy with the dog, apparently chiding him for being away from his house? Cav was talking to them softly, not yet noticing the new arrival. 

" **I'm sorry** " The boy said nervously, his voice with a noticeable echo. He looked like he was going to say more but decided against it. 

"Ssokay" Dakota slurred a bit, then shook his head to clear it "it's fine, you were just in the wrong place in the wrong time. Noone got hurt, it's fine" He murmured, trying to be quiet enough for others not to notice. 

" **I was just wandering around, with Diogee here, and wound up coming to you** " The boy shrugged uselessly. The dog barked softly, as if in affirmation.

"Did you say something?" Dakota looked up to see Melissa staring at him, a little wide eyed. 

"Not much, no" 

" **Can they hear me?** " Milo wondered aloud. Mel's eyes widened further. Zack seemed to catch up to whatever she was hearing and stared at Dakota as well. He really didn't like that. 

" **They didn't before** " The boy continued, the odd echo continuing "what's different"

Dakota thought of something. He reached into his inner pocket and pulled out the ghost device. It made a static sort of noise and a small light beside the display was shining red. "I think this thing is legit" He hummed. Cavendish looked at him a tad bewildered. He just shrugged. 

"Is that" Zack sorta gasped quietly. Mel nodded at him. 

"Milo is that you?" She asked, a hope in her voice. 

" **Mel?** " He called, the staticky echo of his voice now more obvious. 

"MILO!" She called, louder, snatching the device from Dakota's hands "where the hell are you, where have you been?!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled while writing this, hence is why it took so long. This was because of 1)deadlines of uni and 2)I had the least amount of things prepared for it so far.  
> Fun fact, I wrote most of this chapter while drunk, and it's unclear if it's noticeable.


	9. Spider on the wall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Please don't  
> Think of me  
> Forever in the  
> Wrong  
> Way

" **I'm sorry** " Was the only thing he could say. He knew that he couldn't just keep repeating it, but looking at his friends, clutching desperately at the little walkie-talkie-like device and ranting at him how worried they were and where was he and all the other things, it just… made him speechless. 

"It's ok" Melissa finally breathed out, her eyes visibly wet "just tell us where you are. We can punch you for scaring us After you return"

"Yeah" Zack agreed with a smile that looked like it could shatter into a million pieces at a moment's notice. 

" **I'm… I'm sorry** " He repeated uselessly, fidgeting with his hands. Diogee sat by his feet like a good little dog he was and pressed his warm side against his leg. He could almost feel it. No one seemed to notice. 

"Sorry for what?" Zack asked, smile gone, worry mixing with newfound confusion "what are you apologizing for? Did you do something?"

" **I don't… I don't know, no, I don't think I…** " He looked at them in search of understanding. They weren't looking at him, of course not, they couldn't see him, what else did he expect. 

"Then what?" Mel asked, gently but with a force behind her words. 

" **I'm… I'm not…** " He sighed and the sound echoed eerily within the device " **I'm not coming back** " There. He said it. He felt his own eyes sting, distantly. Water dripped off his face. 

"What?! Why?" Mel questioned, louder than perhaps necessary. Thankfully no one besides their sorry little group was around. Dakota and Cavendish were on lookout just for that, and perhaps also to give them space. 

"Milo, where are you? Did you get into trouble with someone, we can help?" Zack offered, more and more confusion crossing his features. 

" **No, it's not… that. I can't come back. I'm not here anymore** "

"What the hell does that mean, Milo?" Mel looked on the verge of tears and sounded proper angry, which was honestly fair "we haven't heard anything from you for over half a year, we found your backpack not attached to you several days after we last did hear from you, and now you're talking through a walkie-talkie of some random people" She took a deep breath and shook her head "i'm sorry, but don't try to be vague with us. Spill, why can't you come back"

" **I'm sorry, I'm… I'm really not here anymore** " He hated this. He hated this entire situation " **I mean, I am, I'm in front of you, god I wish you could see me, but I'm not really here, not…** " He was rambling now. God, why was he talking so much. 

"..Milo?" Zack asked, nervously, looking around rapidly before settling his gaze back on the device "what do you mean, can't see?"

" **I died** " Milo finally forced himself to say, and the tiny echo of the device rung in his head " **I'm gone, I'm not coming** " Were they tears rolling down his cheeks or just more cold water? " **I'm really sorry** "

***

Dakota was far enough away to not hear the words being said but not far enough away to not see the impact they were having. He really pitied the three teens in front of them, they deserved better. 

Somewhere, in the logical side of his mind that wasn't bothered by the melancholy of the scene before him, he drew some conclusions for the events he was subjected to. 

First, those kids selling ghost equipment were not fooling around in the slightest. If this thing worked exactly how advertised, which still bewildered him with just how easy it was to get it to work, how did the other things he bought fair? Did all of them work exactly like they were supposed to? Why has this not taken off yet? 

Second, they really were his friends after all. That was sorta good to know, in a vague sad sort of way. At least he remembered that much. 

And three, judging by the way that little dog, Diogee was his name? was acting, it seemed like he could see the ghost. Which raised the question: was that just how it was meant to work because he was the boy's dog in life or could all animals see ghosts? 

But the part of him that thought logically wasn't all of him. Most of him was emotionally distraught, just a bit. He liked the kid that haunted their apartment and it was crushing to see him distressed as he was. 

"They'll be fine" Balthazar's voice pulled him out of his thoughts. He looked up at the other man. 

"I didn't say anything"

"It was written all over your face" The man commented and Vinnie tried to mock an offended expression. 

"How do you know?" He asked in the end. 

"It always does. Losing a loved one is hard but people overcome it by the end. This is… " He gestured vaguely with his hands "A bit different, I concur, but it is that basic idea. It's hard to accept but they're young. They'll heal"

"And Milo?"

"I'm sure he'll be fine as well"

"I hope you're right" Dakota sighed. 

"It'll be fine, Kota" Cavendish smiled down at him, placing a hand on his shoulder "we'll help if we can, won't we?"

"Of course" 

Things seemed to have come to ahead in the conversation they couldn't hear as there seemed to be a heavy stunned silence over them for a moment. There seemed to be tears involved. The little dog seemed to be trying to comfort the two living teens. It didn't seem to help too much. 

***

"What… what happened?" Zack asked in a voice that made Milo's heart break that much more. Mel had buried her face in his shoulder, holding onto the other boy for dear life. 

" **I don't know** " Milo answered, feeling like it was an inadequate thing to say " **I didn't remember much up until recently, and I still don't know how… what happened** "

"Oh" The other boy mumbled, looking to the ground. 

" **I'm sorry** "

"Listen it's… " Milo knew what he was going to say. 'Not your fault'. It was an automatic response, he'd heard it all before. 

Except it was kind of his fault, wasn't it? He made this situation happen, maybe not on purpose but it was his doing. He did something wrong and now he was here. And his friends were hurting because of it. 

" **I stayed with you** " He confessed " **I didn't know why, but I… I was with you two** "

"We thought things kept going sideways around us" Zack chuckled. There wasn't humor in it "I even thought this thing was cursed from being next to you too long, but I guess… " He trailed off, pating the strap of the backpack offhandedly. 

" **I'm sorry** "

"Don't… don't apologize so much. It was fine" It wasn't fine and he knew it. 

Mel made a particularly loud sob. Milo just held back another apology. He reached out to her despite himself and put a hand on her cheek. He knew it didn't mean anything to the rest of the world but he couldn't help himself. 

To his surprise Melissa froze. After a moment of not moving she held up a hand to her cheek, hovering just over his own hand. She slowly turned to face him, or almost him, staring directly through him like she did before. 

Her hand was warm. He could almost feel it. 

"7 months" She whispered. Her words rung in his head like icicles falling to the ground. 

" **I'm so sorry** " He whispered back. 

"We miss you" She murmured like a confession of love. Zack nodded along, eyes red and puffy from tears. 

He wished he could hug them. He really wished he could. 

***

"So, what's up with those guys?" Zack asked, almost nonchalantly.

" **What do you mean?** " Milo wondered. 

"You know, Cav and Dakota? The odd steampunk feeling fellas? What's their deal?" Zack clarified. 

"And why were you hanging around them?" Melissa asked along. 

Milo sighed, considering how much about his new friends he could share. 

All three of them were at Zack's house. Some time had passed since the events in the park. They had… a lot of catching up to do. Thankfully Dakota graciously let Zack and Melissa take the ghost communication device with them, since he didn't exactly need it. He even said he might have a second one for them later. 

Apparently no one of the Underwood family batted an eye on Zack bringing Diogee with them, which was good because the little dog did not accept staying away from Milo at all. He was quite grateful for it, since the presence of Diogee made him feel better. More whole. More present. 

" **It's a long story** " He started " **They are the only people so far who can see me. As a matter of fact they were the ones to break to me my… situation** "

"And that's a good thing?" Mel asked, raising an eyebrow. 

" **Yeah, I think so. Before that I remembered very little. I just shifted about without understanding where I was or what was happening. I barely even remembered you. I was so confused all the time but just thought that was normal** " He broke off before it could become a tangent. A cold static stopped climbing up his limbs. 

"I see" Mel nodded 

" **I've been around them ever since. I've been basically haunting their apartment for a few weeks. They're nice guys** "

"Why do you think they can see you?"

" **I have no idea honestly** " He shrugged " **I've been thinking about it since I realized only they could and I don't have a clue. From what I can tell they don't either.** "

"Diogee can see you too" Zack pointed out, ruffling the dog's fur gently, earning himself a happy ruff from the animal. 

" **Yeah, he can too** " Milo smiled and reached to do the same. 

"Well, you know how in ghost stories animals can see ghosts too? Maybe it's like that" Mel offered. 

"Could be" Zack agreed. 

" **Yeah** " Milo sighed " **Whichever case, I'm happy that he can. And I'm so happy to finally talk to you guys, it's been… it's been way too long** "

"Agreed" The two teens said in unison. They smiled at each other. It was a good humored smile. Milo laughed. 

They had a lot to talk about. 

***

"Hey, can you believe Mel actually punched Elliot?" Zack forced himself to say through laughter. 

"He had it coming" Melissa laughed as well. 

" **Elliot Decker? The crossing guard?** " Milo asked, intrigued " **What did he do?** "

"He mentioned that one less Murphy around was an improvement. I think a lot of people lost the last bit of respect for him that day" Zack explained. 

"And he deserved a sore jaw for that" Mel added "I regret nothing"

" **That was… mean of him to say** " Milo murmured. He'd heard it before of course, from Elliot too, but still. 

"He learned his lesson" Melissa continued "he's a jerk, Milo, don't take it to heart"

"Says the person who decked a grown man in the jaw" Zack commented. For his troubles he received a pillow thrown in his general direction. 

***

"Hey, I wonder if there was truth to what Mort was saying about crystal divination a while back. He did mention something was weird for a while, didn't he?" Zack wondered aloud, breaking an amiable silence. 

"Oh yeaahh" Mel hummed, remembering "he did lug around some crystals for a while, said he could sense something odd and was trying to figure it out a while back" She looked in the direction she vaguely knew Milo was in "did you do that?"

" **I can't remember now** " He confessed " **But we could ask him, no?** "

"I don't want him to think that all his conspiracy theories are true when he hears about you being a spirit" Zack murmured, already sounding exhausted at the prospect. 

"We don't have to tell him that we know of a ghost, just say we're curious" Mel offered. 

"You have a point" The boy nodded. 

" **You'll ask him then?** "

"Sure"

" **Great. Just ask him not to do a summoning circle. They're not fun** "

***

They talked for a while. Afternoon became evening. Evening became early night. They had a long day. 

So when Milo found both his friends had nodded off in their seats he wasn't in the least bit surprised. The visit turned into an impromptu sleepover. Great. 

They needed rest.

Milo looked over them. Melissa was sprawled haphazardly over the bed, clutching the covers in her sleep. Zack was poised awkwardly, still sitting up, against the headboard. Diogee was nestled in between them, snoring his little doggy dreams quietly. 

Milo smiled at them all. 

" **I miss you too** "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a mess. I tried, Ok? Ok.  
> I don't know if it's any good, if tomorrow I look at it and don't like it I'll probably try to edit it some. Idk  
> Also, throwback to that time when I thought this fic was gonna be 9 chapters long as a whole. Yeah, we're not done here. Honestly I don't know how many chapters are left. We'll see how it goes.


	10. In the glass

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every day is the same  
> We're praying for rain

He couldn’t sleep of course. There were periods of time where he was unaware and sort of unconscious but he had no idea how to trigger those. They just happened.

They used to happen more, but he wasn’t… all there back then. He didn’t like to think about it. 

He looked out at the night sky as seen through the window. There wasn't much of it visible, what with street lights, but the couple of stars he could see were twinkling happily to themselves. 

It was quite serene. 

He was somewhere else now. He didn't quite notice when the bedroom gave way to night forest but he was now surrounded by quiet trees and whispers of the woods. The night sky was clearer here, away from city lights. 

He smiled despite himself. 

He vaguely knew this part of the forest. Not that it mattered, he doubted he could get lost anyway, but it was nice. There was a ledge, sort of a cliff edge, not far from here that he was confident he could find. 

He used to watch the sun setting and rising from there. It was the best place to do so. He wondered how long ago that was now. 

The forest was quiet. Some people would find that eerie. He just found it calming. No noise on the mind. Nothing to break the semi-silence. It felt good. 

The ledge was how he remembered it. Neat. Empty, save for one set of bushes. Covered in green of grass, now glinting mystically in the moonlight. Quiet, save for the very distant roaring of the river. He loved this place. 

He set himself at his usual place, some ways away from the edge and looked up. 

The countless stars looked down at him, twinkling their light in their multitudes. He looked up at them, smiling and alone, like always. 

No. Not alone. Not anymore. He was with friends now. He was with friends again. He had to remember that. 

The first rays of the rising sun offered no warmth. He welcomed them anyway. 

***

Melissa woke up to a complete quiet. She wasn't sure why she even woke up, it was quite early in the morning, the early summer sunrise illuminating the sky outside the window. She didn't feel tired per se, she actually felt quite well for once which was new, but still. She would have preferred to sleep some more. She rolled over onto her other side to get away from the light coming from the window and immediately met resistance. 

Diogee twitched a little at her touch as she partially rolled into him and opened one of his eyes, staring sleepely at her. She reached her hand out to pet him, more a reflex than a conscious action, all the while scooting back just a bit to make space. The little dog leaned into the pets for a moment before settling back into a nap. 

Melissa looked past the dog to see Zack, perched on the bed in a very awkward position, dead asleep and facing away from her. He looked peaceful like that. She loved to see it. 

She felt… better. She thought that maybe that was wrong, considering the events of the day before and the… revelations of thereof, she probably shouldn't have felt like this. Maybe it was denial of some sort, or shock.

She smiled despite herself, eyes half closed and ready to go back to sleep. Last night really was nice. By the end their conversation just became their usual routine, like old times. She missed that. It made her feel better. 

Math was more her field, all this emotion stuff really didn't make sense to her. 

She let her eyes slide closed as she settled, a comfortable silence and warmth surrounding her. 

Her eyes snapped open as the window behind her slammed with a too-loud bang on the adjacent wall. She heard Zack fumble and fall off the bed with a yelp at the sudden noise. A cool gust of cool morning air blew across her back, making her shiver. 

Zack muttered something hurt from the floor where he fell as she lifted herself into a more upright position and looked at the offending set piece. It was inert now, the window hanging wide open but now motionless, the latch seemingly having opened on it's own. 

"What time is it?" She heard Zack ask blearely.

"Like 7" She answered, guesstimating of course as no clock was in sight from her position. The boy groaned in annoyance. 

She had a thought. 

"Morning, Milo" She called experimentally. 

" **Morning** " The ghost device crackled from it's spot on the bedside table " **I'm sorry for waking you** "

"That was you?" Zack asked, slightly tilting his head as he became less bleary-eyed and more awake. 

" **Yeah, it happens** " His voice sounded like he was shrugging " **did you have any plans today?** "

There was a hopefulness in his voice as he asked. Melissa smiled despite herself. Maybe it was wrong, but in some ways she was glad he was back. Even like this. 

"I don't think we did" She started, looking over at Zack. He nodded "but we could go somewhere together? When was the last time we've been to Lard world?"

"Way too long" Zack chuckled "i think last time we might have made something of a junk pile of the Greased Thunder ride, you think they'll let us back in?"

"Yea they will. I'd like to see them try to bar us" Mel crossed her arms in front of her chest. Her smile only widened as the ghost device related delightful if slightly crackly laughter. 

***

" **Listen, at least it wasn't my fault this time** "

Mel laughed at that "sure it wasn't" She said in between laughter

" **It wasn't!** " Came a protest, his voice sounding defensive and indignant. A feeling of cold by her side bristled, just a bit. 

"Fine, sure. The jet ski just shot off by itself without you having anything to do with it"

" **It can happen! I was nowhere near it, they could have left the engine running on accident** "

"Fine, you win" She rolled her eyes in mock annoyance that wasn't fooling anyone "i guess it could have just happened on it's own"

" **Right** " He sounded happy. It was a nice sound. 

"Zack's running late" She commented a few minutes after. 

" **You suppose there could be traffic?** "

"Nah he probably spent too long choosing what to wear. He's been prone to that lately"

" **Gotcha** " Milo hummed, thoughtfully. 

They walked for a little longer through the shaded canopy of the park, returning to the bench that was designated as the meeting spot. It was about 10 after meeting time. Zack was unfashionably late and would get at least a punch as a reward when he showed up. 

Diogee wove his way around Mel's legs and chased a few random pigeons away from the bench with happy barking. He then proceeded to run after one of them, frightening it further but apparently not enough to just fly up. They repeated the process a few times. It really was quite amusing. 

"I've been thinking" Mel started, earning a noise of interest from the receiver in her hands "of getting a pet myself"

" **Ohhh** " Came a semi-gasp " **that's cool. What pet were you thinking?** "

"I had a few in mind" She continued, watching with detached interest as some kids played with an oddly shaped teal dog in the distance "but I'm inclined towards a ferret"

" **Huh… why ferret?** "

"I dunno how to explain it. They're smart and devious. I like them a lot"

" **They're like cats and snakes at the same time** " 

Mel couldn't help but burst out laughing "I guess, sorta?" She managed to say, trying to catch her breath. 

" **They're cool** "

"They are. And they're not even that exotic" She belatedly realized that that teal dog wasn't a dog. For one it seemed to have a beak. 

" **That's true** " 

Mel saw Diogee walk up to the bench and pant happily up into thin air. Then she saw streaks of short fur on his head and back being pressed down with pets. The effect was sorta chilling. The little dog seemed to lean into the pets regardless. 

" **Do you think you would be able to train your ferret?** "

"I'd try my best. I haven't done all my research yet, but i'm certain i would be able to teach it some things"

" **Like tricks?** "

"Possibly" She shrugged. 

" **I hope it can get along with Diogee** " The invisible petting continued and the little dog barked a short quiet bark, confirming that that is him, he's got that name. 

"I'm sure it will. Your dog is the friendliest in the world" She leaned forward to scritch the aforementioned good boy behind the ear. He appreciated it.

***

The last melancholic notes of the guitar song faded away into nothingness. Zack let the guitar pick fall out of his hand and onto his desk as he sighed. 

" **That was great!** " A voice chimed in with great enthusiasm. There was a sound like echoing distorted applause, which made Zack smile a bit " **It sounded really complicated at the end but i loved it!** "

"I'm glad you enjoyed it" He chuckled lightly, setting his instrument down into it's case "glad to see i can still write worthwhile music"

" **Don't be like that** " Milo chided him, good naturedly "Everything you write is nice"

"You'd be surprised at how untrue that is" To be fair he never hated any of the music he wrote. There were however some old drafts that sounded… bad wasn't the word, awkward? Yeah, that worked.

" **I don't believe you** " The other boy chided again 

"Well it's true. Accept it and leave it because i'm not proving it to you" He fake pouted but he was pretty serious with that last part. He never threw away those drafts, sure, but no one was allowed to hear them. 

" **I jest, I jest** " Came the reply in between quiet crackling laughter. He really liked hearing that sound.

"That's all i've really written recently" He continued after a couple moments "i've been drawing more though"

" **Can i see?** " Came an almost immediate question, sorta like he'd hoped " **if you wanna show it of course** "

"Would be happy to" He really would "Mel has seen most of them but other than her you'd pretty much be the only person to ask"

“ **Huh. Limited audience** ”

“Audience size of less that 10 people, you know how it goes” he joked, pulling his latest notebook out of his bag “I’ve been practicing a bunch, I think I improved some since last autumn”

“ **Well you were really good last time I’ve seen your work so i’m excited** ” he sure sounded it.

He felt the slight cold prickle at his side as he sat down on the bed. He took it as a sign of readiness and opened the notebook to start leafing through it.

He hadn’t smiled this much in a while, but making warm conversation, admittedly slightly awkwardly, considering it Was done through a walkie-talkie, while commenting on drawings, made him feel like all was alright again. It was nice.

A small wet mark appeared on the page that was opened. It was immediately followed by a noise of distress and the cold feeling leaving. “ **I’m sorry!** ” the other boy apologized, sounding shrill and stressed “ **I forgot, I forgot that happened** ”

“Hey, it’s ok” Zack reassured, checking that it was actually fine. It was, the water didn’t spread far, it didn’t reach the next page. He refocused on the image on the page. It was of Mel, a pencil piece that he was quite proud of “what happened anyway?”

“ **I reached out, I forgot there was water** ” he murmured “ **I really liked it. I don’t know** ”

“It’s ok. Come back, nothing bad happened” Zack smiled into thin air, hoping it would help “If anything, I’m really glad you liked this one. I was really proud of it”

“ **Yeah** ” the other boy murmured, presumably coming back “ **It’s really nice. You draw people so well** ”

“Thanks, I try” he chuckled “I’ve been working on it. Still not that great at animals”

“ **Ah, why so?** ”

“Just hadn’t figured it out yet” he shrugged “I hope I will. They’re hard to draw as well, have you seen cats? They’re like mostly liquid”

“ **Yeah they are!** ”

“But then they got bones sticking out everywhere anyway? How cats”

“ **That’s their secret. We aren’t allowed to know** ”

“Witchcraft!”

They definitely were laughing loud enough for a passerby to hear through the window. It was really good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to do something less sad and, dare I say, warm? Fluffy? Because they deserve rest, my kids.  
> I'm sorry for the delay, it's been a hard time irl. Nothing bad happened, don't worry, but i've been having exams. It's very anxiety inducing as you can understand. Biology is hard.  
> In other news, the fatigue from a few months ago is back. Hypersomnia is not a friend to writing :')


	11. It's alright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything's green and gold  
> So i'm not in hell yet

Dakota trained his eyes on the tools in his hands, making small, deliberate movements. The tiny, delicate screwdriver turned in his hands as he worked on the broken clock in front of him, brow furrowed in concentration. 

It wasn't their day off per se but they didn't have an assignment for the day and the only real job he had yet to do was filling out a report for their latest outing and he desperately did not want to do that. So here he was, elbows deep in a gutted dead clock so to speak. It was a hard task to accomplish, fixing a clock, but it was far less anxiety inducing than filling out paperwork. Maybe he could get Cavendish to do it when he returned. He was far better at that anyway. 

The screw he was working on loosened enough to get free and he picked it up with a steady hand. These old mechanical clocks were fascinating and he found himself smitten with their inner workings from a fairly young age. They weren't as widespread in his time of course, making way for the absolutely accurate time pieces that ran on time juice, but these intricate little machines always felt more natural to him. How they managed to keep an accurate count through just turning cogs and wound up springs. 

The skill of working with these wonderful machines was viewed as a fairly useless one by a lot of the people he knew, most of his family included, but he never regretted picking it up. If anything it was a nice hobby.

The tablet with the unfilled report sat at the edge of the table tauntingly. He pointedly didn't pay attention to it. 

Another screw came loose under his tools. He pulled it out and was able to peel the panel he was working on away, revealing the dark metal cogs, unmoving but pretty nonetheless. 

He felt the air move across the back of his neck and realized that no clock was going to be fixed that day. In a best case scenario this mechanism wasn't going to break further. He put down his tools and went to pack away the parts he had lying around. 

"Hey Milo" He called, not looking up "how have you been?"

"Hey Dakota" A more or less cheerful voice called out from his rocking chair "I've been well, you?"

"Yeah, me too" He wrapped the smaller parts in bubble wrap and put them away. 

"Did I interrupt something?"

"Not really, I was just tinkering" Vinnie answered, finally looking up at the boy. He looked like he always did, but he seemed to be doing well. He was as tangible as he could get. 

"I didn't know you fixed watches" The boy murmured in an awed tone "That's cool"

"We don't have a lot of such clocks where i'm from, but I really love them. It's really nice to work on"

"That's nice" The boy murmured with an absent smile on his face. Dakota found the corners of his lips inching up despite himself. 

"You've been feeling better, huh?" He asked

"I guess so" The boy chuckled, the sound not as echoing as it used to be "it feels… better to talk to more people"

"I getcha" The man nodded "where's your dog, what was his name?" He was under the impression that the dog did not want to leave his boy alone ever again, which seemed fair. 

"Diogee" Dakota chuckled despite himself as the boy continued "and he's at my family's house. They miss him and we're afraid they'll get suspicious if he stays away too long and I promised to come back for him soon" He seemed to get slightly apprehensive as he talked. Just a bit. But enough for Vinnie to notice. 

"You haven't told them then?" He asked, furrowing his brow. 

"No" Came the boy's reply, short and sad. 

"Why not?"

"It's… complicated. I don't know. They can't… see me and I hoped they would when i first came to the house back then, but" He shrugged uselessly, fidgeting with his hands.

"You told your friends. They can't see you" Dakota offered. 

"They're… different. I sorta didn't have a choice, and even then, they're… I don't know. It's difficult." He rubbed at the back of his neck, uncomfortably. 

"It's ok. I understand" He didn't truly but he saw that it was difficult "i'm sorry i asked"

"It's fine. I should tell them sometime, it's just" He gestured vaguely with his hands and it spoke of things being complicated "you know?"

"Yeah"

There was a brief silence, that thankfully didn't last long enough to become awkward. 

"So, what have you been up to? Haven't seen you as much lately" Dakota asked, trying to sound nonchalant to steer away from the sore topic. 

"I've been all over the place recently" the boy smiled brightly "been hanging out with Mel and Zack and just generally going places with them. We've even been to 'Lard world'"

"And how'd that go?" The man could already imagine the chaos. 

"Better than last time, honestly! The rollercoaster didn't break this time" he looked up, as if remembering something "we had some bad luck at the games there, but other than that there was almost no destruction"

"That's good to hear"

"We're going to try to go to the fair when it comes around this month. I dunno how that's gonna go though, but we hope fine!"

"Sounds fun. I think we might swing around there too, see what's what"

"What about you then? What have you and Cavendish been up to?"

"Well, we had a mission yesterday that went ok. We could have been smoother about it but it turned out fine"

"What did you have to do?"

"Nothing too exciting, another fetch quest. Our boss seems to like dishing those out. Not so far back this time, they wanted a copy of some document, i already forget which, from the nineties"

"Huh. Any idea why?"

"No clue" Vinnie shrugged "it doesn't matter. We did it, our boss didn't get mad at us, so it's whatever. Still gotta fill out the report for it though" He glared at the tablet at the edge of the table, still taunting him. 

"So, there's still paperwork in the future?"

"There might actually be more of it in the future" Kota sighed. 

"Oh the humanity" Milo murmured, keeping a straight face. 

"You're telling me"

***

_He wasn't sure where he was. It was warm and damp and he was running and there was something behind him and he couldn't stop. His lungs burned and he feared he would fall any second now but he never stopped. The thing behind him was close, he could almost hear it breathe, a snarling, bestial sound that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end._

_He could breathe. His legs were betraying him. He didn't stop._

_His foot caught on something and he was falling.  
Falling.  
Falling.  
Forever.  
There was no ground in sight, only endless air rushing past him, robbing him of the breath he already lacked. He tried to scream, call for anyone, anything, but his voice was lost to the roar of wind. _

_His skin tingled, as if set on fire, a burning heat dancing across his form. He wrenched his eyes shut and tried to endure it but it only got worse, a liquid fire washing over him in a tidal wave, burning.  
Burning.  
Burn-_  


When his eyes snapped open he was fine. The memory of violent winds and burning waves echoed uncomfortably in his mind, but it was fading fast. He took a deep breath and sat up in bed. 

His hands were shaking. He took in a few shallow breaths, trying his best to be quiet. The digital clock showed a merciless 3 am. Figures, he just had to have a nightmare again. They had a job to do tomorrow and here he was, awake in the dead of night for no good reason. He really envied Dakota for just sleeping through the entire night like it wasn't even a problem. Then again he could sleep at any time. Unlike him. 

He hated the fact that he kept having these nightmares. He could barely even remember them, let alone make any sense of what they meant. It was all very inconvenient and, if he was being honest with himself, annoying. 

He rubbed his eyes, the last of the distress finally evaporating, leaving him just tired. Tired and shaky. He sighed. 

A sound caught his ear. 

He assumed he just woke up because of the distress of the dream but now he wasn't so sure. There was a noise that, now that he turned his attention towards it, was unmissable. It sounded like static, or maybe like water running? He couldn't quite tell. He glanced over to find that his partner was, in fact, dead asleep. So, what was going on then? 

He climbed out of bed, the floor just a bit too cold under his bare feet, and made his way out into their living room. The sound was more present here, louder, definitely a noise or running water. The room itself seemed to be quiet and still, however, so he walked on. 

He tracked the noise to their bathroom. It almost sounded like a shower running, which was odd. Did one of them forget to turn it off before turning in for the night? No, he was the last one in bed and it was definitely off then, so why? 

Upon opening the door and flipping on a light he discovered that it was, indeed, the shower. It didn't seem to be broken, at least superficially, so he really had no idea what business it had to run in the middle of the night. 

Some water splashed onto the sleeve of his pajama as he turned the handle to off. It was ice cold. He did his best to suppress cringing at the feeling. 

A quiet took over the apartment. He suddenly felt a bit too alone. The room was cold and still and he just wanted to go back to a warm blanket and sleep for a few more hours, but then again… he didn't want to go back to running. Or falling. Or burning. He shuddered. Maybe a couple more minutes. Yeah, that was fine. 

***

"Hey..?"

Balthazar turned to see a silhouette of his partner, vaguely visible in the doorway of the kitchen "hey, did i wake you?"

"No, I just woke up and you weren't there so I went to look" the other man replied, sleepiness permeating his voice "are you ok?"

Cavendish failed to reply. He just opened his mouth to say he was fine but then just closed it again, fiddling with a glass of water in his hands. 

"Bad dream again, huh?"

"Yeah…" He confessed with an amount of apprehension in his voice "I thought they were gone but I guess…"

"Guess not then, huh?"

"Yeah" 

He looked down at the glass in his hands, defeated. A moment later he saw another set of hands gently pry it from his slack grip and put it away before a set of arms wrapped itself around his form in an embrace. He returned it without thinking about it. 

"It's gonna be ok, Cav" Dakota reassured "They'll go away again. If they don't they'll have me to deal with" 

He chuckled at that, weakly. The hands around him just tightened slightly. It was nice. 

"I'm sure nightmares are afraid of you, o mighty Vincent Dakota" He murmured. 

"They should be. I'll kick their ass"

"That'd be nice" He smiled weakly. The shaking of his hands was lessening, a good sign. 

"Do you wanna go back and lie down?"

"I'd like that, yea"

***

The rest of his night was quiet and, thankfully, dreamless. He was really glad of that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woops, i meant to do something else but now we're in melancholy town again :}  
> In other news, I'm finally done with exams! Now i have like two weeks to sleep and do stuff again.  
>   
>  _*claps hands*_ alright, would any of my _*checks notes*_ approximately 10 readers like to make predictions?  
> Yea, I sorta only recently actually realized that yall don't actually know what happened to my boy? I mean, it's intentional, but it only really hit me a little bit ago. Still, if yall have any guesses I would adore to hear them.


	12. Scattered and lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Of hope and curiosity.

For a while things became sort of a routine. Sometimes they would come home from a job to a little cream-colored dog sitting at their door, waiting patiently for them. Sometimes the dog would scratch for them to let him in. Sometimes they found him lounging in the rocking chair in the corner, veiled by fog.

Vinnie was content with the arrangement that they worked out without ever talking about it. Some days the ghost stayed at his friends' places. Sometimes he stayed with him and Cavendish. His dog followed him everywhere. Cavendish complained initially but bought a small pack of dry dog food unprompted. Dakota made sure not to mention it out loud though. 

It lasted for some weeks. On good days Milo would watch Dakota tinker with his watch repair kit, or watch Cavendish sew or cook, or talk to one or both of them about something or other, regarding their jobs, regarding tv shows, whatever really. There weren't many bad days, but there were some. Their tv almost met it's untimely demise on one, making it out with just a scare, and on another their kitchen faucet broke without warning, releasing a fountain of cold water. Even after repairs it still dripped every once in a while. 

Besides those days Milo looked and behaved happier. He didn't get lost in thought quite as much and most of the time was, well, present. Almost tangible. 

Yet despite that there were moments. Moments when Vinnie would meet the boy's gaze and see the hollowness of his eyes and it would remind him. 

And he would begin to wonder why everything that happened to them all so far has happened. What was it for? 

Why was this child still hanging around after death? 

He wasn't the only one thinking about it. 

***

" **Do you know about ghosts in the future?** " Came the boy's question one afternoon. The two of them were in the living room, with Balthazar reading in the next room. Dakota took a moment to think whether or not he heard the question correctly. 

"Sort of, yes" He answered, stilted and hesitant. 

" **Did you ever find out why… why ghosts…** "

"Stick around?" He received a nod "Not completely. There are very few recorded cases and they sorta… vary in context, i guess?"

" **So… it's different for everyone?** "

"That's the consensus in our time. It's also very hard to know or study anything of this nature because of… well… " Because of trauma mostly. Trauma of the loved ones, and of the ghost themself. Just a whole bouquet of pain. He shivered. "Why do you ask?"

" **I was just thinking about it again. That I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing, why am I still here. I almost thought that maybe I would stick around for a while and fade away, but it never happened. So, what do I do?** "

"Fade away?"

" **It was just a guess** " His abrupt tone suggested that it wasn't at all a guess but the man didn't press the issue. 

"There's the whole 'unfinished business' thing in media that has ghosts in it. Maybe that's what you're supposed to do?"

" **I've thought about it** " the boy shrugged " **I don't think I have anything i'd want to finish that bad** "

"What was the last thing you did?"

" **I don't… I don't quite remember. It's all blurry, i don't know what i was doing. I only remember snippets by the end...** " The look in his eyes was far off and far away. The things that he remembered were unpleasant, that was understandable. 

"Maybe that's what it is. You don't remember what happened right before you.. " He bit his tongue before he ended the sentence. 

" **You can say *died*** " The boy smiled at him in a sad way. 

"Right. Well, you don't remember what happened before that, so maybe you're supposed to find out?"

" **I… i guess it makes sense, but… what if that's not it?** "

"It's worth a try" Dakota murmured, kindly. He reached out and placed his hand on the boy's shoulder. The icy water from the soaked west robbed his palm and fingers of any warmth they had but he just smiled at Milo. 

" **I guess so** " The boy sighed lightly and smiled back. 

Even if it really was wrong there wasn’t harm in finding out.

That was a lie. Again, trauma for all parties involved. 

But maybe it would be closure.

***

_When they last hear of him it's November. They're making plans. They are to meet the next day to hang out over the weekend. They go their separate ways like usual, throwing out hasty goodbyes for the evening._

_He never shows up. His phone is dead when they call. Zack suggests it's fine, that their friend will show up soon enough, he's just off on another Murphy's law shenanigan. Mel agrees, reluctantly. She's got an uneasy feeling she's choosing to ignore._

_Two days later they still haven't heard anything. His family hasn't seen him for about as long as they haven't. All of them are worried now._

_They search for him all over. Melissa employs her father's help. Zack calls his mother, just in case. No incidents in the city for days. Nothing Murphy related in the hospital. He is nowhere to be found._

_Next day his backpack is found on the side of the road. One of it's straps is undone, roughly torn off the main body of the bag on one side. Some of the contents are broken as if having been struck. The bag is dusty, as if it laid there by the side of the road for a long time._

_They try their best not to lose hope. Their worry only grows worse._

_There's an official search that comes up with nothing but officers' apologies. At some point there are missing persons posters up._

_At some point, early on, Eliot cracks a joke at the expense of the situation. He's laying on the ground clutching at the side of his jaw not 10 seconds later. Melissa wants to yell at him but only ends up whispering. There are tears in her eyes that only Zack sees. Eliot shuts up after that._

_Their hope is paper thin but still there. The Murphy family tries to stay upbeat and optimistic. The veil is very thin and their devastation is visible through._

_It hurts but time goes on. After a month of nothing changing it's almost angering. But time doesn't stop._

_The searching slows. Melissa feels her fear and hope meld and dull into tiredness. She's exhausted from worrying. Zack feels his guilt sharpen. He knows in his head that it's not his fault, but it's not enough. They both know what these feelings are. They hate them._

_Life continues on. It is duller. Less colourful than it used to be. They accept that, not without a fight, but time passes. Months pass._

_They miss him. Truly and deeply._

_And while there's hope they can't move on. Not truly, not yet. So they don't._

_They both have nightmares at times. Rarely, on darker, colder nights they dream of falling and hurt, of ice and wind, of vines, snaking up and around and choking and-_

_They never remember these dreams, not really, but the feeling lingers. They discuss it sometimes. It helps. For the most part._

***

_‘Hey Mort, meet us tomorrow in the corner street diner. 14:00, bring your occult stuff. Will explain on the spot’_

Mort stared at the chat screen with the message box slowly fading to show that he's read it. Melissa texted him maybe thrice a year, mostly about band practice, which was suspended indefinitely for a long while now. Also she texted at reasonable hours and, unless his clock deceived him, it was 1am. Why he was awake was his own business, but why was Mel? And what did she want? 

Well. Whatever. Might as well, no one ever wanted to know Anything about his occult hobby, so he wasn't gonna waste the opportunity to talk about it. 

He set a reminder for the next day. Wouldn't want to forget. 

***

Zack fidgeted with the straps on the backpack in his lap as he waited. They'd gotten here early to take a table but now they had nothing much to do. 

The transmitter had to be turned off in a public place. Also not to spook Mort. 

This sadly meant that they couldn’t talk to their friend. But at least they could tell he was there, since they’d learned the tell of the creeping cold. It was subtle, missable, but the hair on the back of his neck stood on end because of it. He took comfort in it. He suspected Mel did too.

***

"What is it that you wanted to meet me for?"

Mel wasn't oblivious to Mort's attempts to seem more formal and professional. It didn't really suit him and just felt odd but she refrained from calling him out on it. 

"You remember how you talked about spiritual weirdness a few months back?" She started "could you explain what that was"

Mort narrowed his eyes suspiciously at them "why?"

"Call it a bet" Zack explained "if everything pans out we'll tell you later who won"

The other boy nodded but continued to be suspicious, even if less so now "ok. Well, from what I could tell it was something spiritual. Some new element was added to the system which sent the energies haywire for a while"

He sounded vague. "What could do that?" Melissa asked. 

"Many things can actually! Spiritually charged items, psychically gifted people, spirits and so on"

There. That's what they needed to hear "spirits as in ghosts?" Zack asked, cautiously. 

"Yeah, does it matter?" The other boy asked, tilting his head just a bit. 

"Not particularly, just curious" Zack shrugs with feigned uncaring

"Ghosts can upset the balance of things, which may lead to all sorts of things. Blocked chakras, fuzziness of foresight in psychics, problems with definition activities, bad dreams, that sort of thing" Mort continued. He was about to say something else when a ringtone put a stop to that. 

Zack scrambled to get his phone and, glancing at the screen for just a moment, answered it, getting up from the table. He waved at Mel and Mort that he'll be back in a moment then walked out. 

The feeling of cold left with him. Mel rubbed her shoulders with her hands to get rid of the last of the chill. 

"Now that i think about it" Mort continued after a brief silence "it feels like it would be a ghost, doesn't it? The way the weirdness came and went at times? Like they were around and then they weren't"

"You think so" She feigned interest "is there anything more you can tell about it?"

"Not too much sadly" He shrugged "i'm only practicing as an amateur, you can go to a professional psychic"

"We'll see about that i guess" She hummed

Mort moved to say something but was, once more, interrupted, this time by Zack coming back. "It was nice seeing you again be i think we'll be going now"

"What happened?" She asked, concern rising within her. 

"I'll explain on the way, see ya later dude" He waved at the other boy while picking up the backpack. Mel got up, more concerned now. Zack quickly bundled her out of the diner. She waved at Mort briefly and allowed herself to be led away. 

"Zack?" She asked once outside. 

"Dakota called. Apparently they found something about Milo and were going to go check it out. Wanted to know if we wanted to join them" He explained, barely keeping his breath as they walked at a good pace "i said yes, they offered to pick us up in 20 minutes"

"Found what?"

"Last known place? Something like that. They pinpointed the chunk of road where his backpack was found and decided to go look in case the search missed something"

"As good a move as any I suppose" Mel added. 

"That's what I thought" Zack smiled at her, just a bit. The cold wind accompanied their progress.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, i'm filled with sadness and i write like it.
> 
> This chapter took a lot of energy to do. I had some trouble, but I think it turned out ok!  
> Theories still welcome :)


End file.
